This Lesbian Poem by Akhaji Zakiya

from Lisa C Moore's Does Your Mama Know?: An Anthology of Black Lesbian Coming Out Stories

one thing ive noticed is that for some reason there are a Lot more dogmatically exclusionary lesbians on tumblr than there are dogmatically exclusionary gay men.

this is exactly why I'm supposed to be on tumblr sabbatical because half the women on here are normal intelligent people who dont post that much about feminism and the other half of women are raging misogynists who hate men but not as much as they hate that one woman in their life who they think causes all their problems. And then they project that anger towards one specific woman onto all other women

get outta here if you defend any "radfem" type movements or call your self one. idgaf if you claim you're trans inclusive or even if you're trans.

You should be suspicious of every post that posits lesbians as the historical “villian” of lgbt activitism actually

"decenter men"

u r a woman that dates cis het men.

⚠️ This identity has been reclaimed from a bigot who actively fakeclaims other systems ⚠️

Complexpunk

For anyone who has a complex identity and thinks anyone who doesn't support them can fuck off.

This includes:

• Non-traumagenic systems/Non-disordered systems

• Otherkin

• Therians

• Mspec gays/lesbians

• Gaybians

• Lesboys/Turigirls

• Xenogender

• Label and gender hoarders

• Cuspers (on the cusp between cisgender and transgender)

• Gendered agender

• Transmascfem(neu)

This does NOT include:

• Exclusionists

• Gatekeeprs

• Seperatists

• Reactionaries

08/31/23 ~ 10:40 P.M.

My advice to separatists

The woman in the above video used to be in an abusive marriage and escaped. In this video, she explains that abuse victims only leave when they themselves are ready. So straight from the horse's mouth, most efforts to get abused women get out those situations are futile.

The dynamics between men and women as a class mirror the dynamics of an abusive relationship. Just like how abuse victims leave only when they are ready to leave, women will only leave men as a class alone only when they are ready.

This is why on this blog, for as long as I can remember, I have always discouraged seperatists from trying to convince women to give up men because just like most abuse victims, they completely ignore you or they make you the villian: evil lesbian (eventhough straight seperatists exist) that is trying to steal them away from their prince charming for your own sexual benefit.

Leave these women alone, offline and online. They are not ready and to be honest, most of them will never be. Stop going on their posts to debate them, matter of fact I suggest you block the ones who are lying about the epidemic of seperatists bullying OSA women (again denying the existence of straight seperatists to create a narrative). I understand the human instinct to clear your reputation but this is Tumblr. It is important to remember that the "loss of good reputation" on here absolutely has no impact on the quality of our lives. Yes, in the short term, you will be upset but you will quickly get over it because it has no impact on your long term life.

Just like offline you can tell when an abuse victim is ready to actually leave and just needs guidance and some resources, you can also do that online. While it is definitely harder to read people's behaviours online, it is not possible. For those of you who still take Tumblr activism seriously, you can guide genuinely interested women to valuable resources.

FYI, We need to STOP assuming that just because a person is in radfem spaces, that they are smart or have critical thinking skills. Most people come to radfem spaces because of the anti-transactivism and sometimes anti-porn positions. Contrary to what transactivism would have you believe, one doesn't need to have a pHD in human biology to differentiate between human males and females. That is actually common sense that has existed for a centuries or even millenia. Just because someone knows men cannot become women doesn't make an intellectual. That is like saying a person brushing their teeth makes them an intellectual because some people don't brush their teeth. Furthermore, phD holders can know a lot in their subject area and be clueless in others [A person can be absolutely smart in one area and completely dumb in another].

Many of people on here are actually not smart and you can tell by the dumb shit they confidently say. You shouldn't waste your time arguing with dumb people, offline or online.

I wanted to make a all inclusive/alternate Lesbian flag

Introducing, the Dusk Lesbian flag!

Small explainations of the stripes and Hex codes under cut

(If you are a exclusionist/terf/lesbian seperatist/any form of gatekeeper or bigot this flag is not for you)

Lesbian Attraction: This stripe is meant to represent all ways someone may experience lesbian attraction. Romantic, sexual, queerplatonic, sensual, polyamorious and any other I didn’t mention

Sexuality: A stripe centering around lesbian sexuality

Femmes/Pride: Representing femmes and pride of being a lesbian

Community/Inclusion of all Lesbians: This stripe represents the community and unconditional inclusion of every lesbian, everyone who is a lesbian is welcomed with open arms

Trans/Nonbinary/Futch Lesbians: Centering trans/nonbinary lesbians, highlighting trans lesbians, nonbinary lesbians (no matter the gender alignment or if they are multigender or genderfluid) and futches (someone who is both butch and femme/a mix of butch and femme)

Diversity/History: This stripe is representing the many diverse ways of how you can be a lesbian (nonbinary lesbian, aspec lesbian,mspec lesbian, he/him, they/them lesbians, butch/futch/femme lesbians and many more) and the vast history of lesbians

Masc Lesbians/Butches: This stripe stands for masculine lesbians (he/him lesbians, any lesbian who may identify as a boy/masc in some way) and butches

your nun au. i like it very much. if you don't mind, can you tell me more about it? like what is shadowheart's story? what is up with lae'zel? why is karlach so cute?

Absolutely, I am very eager to talk about it! This is gonna be long tho haha. tw for addiction and self-harm

Shadowheart grew up in a relatively normal, casually Catholic family, but shes always had shit going on. Clinically depressed, and she definitely has a personality disorder, probs BPD, defs not diagnosed because its the 90's and shes masking HEAVY. Even as a kid she was pretty into catholicism though, and liked Christ and his weird more-than-human self sacrificial vibes.

At 13 while in boarding school she got lured into a cult (where she was given her name). This was a mix of older girls and a few much older people outside the boarding school, all women. They were a political cult of feminist seperatists, but also had a layer of idiosyncratic spiritualism originating entirely from the cult leader Shar (real name Sharon). Edgy stuff about darkness, the night, pain and sacrifice being good. But in particular there was a focus on pursuing oblivion, and that resulted in Shadowheart doing some very destructive substances at a very young age, and learning how effective numbness was when coping with being a depressed teenager with BPD. She realised she was a lesbian while in this group, and that wasn't great because Shar was Not chill about that at all. These were radical second wave feminists that considered sex inherently reproductive of patriarchal power dynamics, and the cult was firmly asexual; lesbians were considered gender traitors and particularly looked down on. (Transgender people were not even acknowledged; truly old school r*dfems.) Her attraction to women is what made her question things most throughout her time there, but she was very young and impressionable; she wouldn't start to really firmly question things until she was 16.

She was, through all of this, a big fan of Christ; in fact some of the cult's ideology kinda deepend her concept of Christ and martyrdom, which she admired greatly. Self sacrifice was The Ultimate Virtue to her; a loving masochism, which really spoke to her (and her self-harming tendencies).

She escaped at 17 and didn't return home; she immediately became a novitiate within an Irish-Catholic cloister. This would have been in the early 80's. She dove head first into being a dedicated cloistered nun; it wasn't that different from her time in Shar's group except a lot more sober. When she took her vows and became a full fledged nun, she descended further into worship and over her 10 years there, she became more and more... Medieval with it.

This was a Problem, because this was the late 80's moving into the early 90's in the UK - not only was Vatican II well and truly instilled in the practices of all cloisters, but feminism had been kicking around for a while now and had only gotten more popular. Nuns being hidden away from the world, participating in shame circles and self flagellating was well and truly Over and were banned practices. But Shadowheart researched older methods of worship from deeply devoted cloistered nuns and dove in, because they felt meaningful, helped her cope and they made her feel special to Christ.

Something that had a big impact on her was her duties as a volunteer nun overlapping with the AIDS crisis. She found that she had to consistently fight her sisters and abbess to be allowed to assist people with HIV. This forced her to contend with her queerness, the morality of her relationship to other gay people. That prompted her to start exploring lesbianism and queer community secretly, which tempered her obsessive cloistered nun tendencies; she still self flagellated and prized self sacrifice, but her shame was being challenged, and she had felt how much she wanted diverse, queer community.

Her and Lae'zel started hooking up when she was 25; it started as moments of desperate desire for relief and comfort, but became a little more than that as time went on. (It fucked with Lae'zel A Lot.) Shadowheart was finally kicked out at 27 when not only was she caught with another nun (not Lae'zel), the extent of her self-harm was seen on her body. She became too much of a liability for the cloister. Very soon after that, Karlach appeared in her apartment.

I'll expand on Lae'zel in a reblog >:)

do i still get to be an evil lesbian seperatist bæddel if i like loser bisexual men?

as long as the rest of the compound gets to play dress up with him yea that's fine

hey!! i would love to know your thoughts on how Marla’s character changes in a gender bent version of fight club :)

my thoughts on Marla as a man are (edit: WERE. this got long) much less fully formed than my thoughts of the narrator and Tyler if they were women, but I'll share what I've been kicking around!

Firstly, I've done all my characterization by looking at the characters in the original, looking at them with respect to how the narrator is a gay man (this is canonical to me, I understand it's an interpretation but I simply don't bother with others, and honestly even if you don't consider that interpretation it remains that the narrative itself was written by a gay man and it really echoes in the characters) and then letting things fold out.

I said in another post a while ago that while Marla fucks the narrator/Tyler, ultimately I don't think shes actually in any form of a relationship with them and is most bonded with a sense of friendship. Which I think I would keep, with Martin (what I decided to name male Marla).

Additionally, the narrator has a lot of semi surpressed rage about Marla — arguably about how easy she is able to do what he wants, ie fuck men, fuck Tyler, etc. about how she is an unavoidable part of his life. about how women are an unavoidable part of his life. Please note, I mean that in a "he's gay" way and not a "he's a male seperatist" way.

So for me, I think Martin would be derived from something of the same. An unavoidable part of the narrators life. Keeps coming around like a stray cat that got fed once or twice. The narrator does not like him. The narrator hates how easily he can do what she wants — be masculine unhindered, unthinking, go through life unencumbered, fuck women, does not even have to think about the shit the narrator does.

I think, also, they would be friends, in the way where they're close, and they know each others' pains even if they can't truly share them. I think Martin would actually be a lot like the narrator — building on Marla's own self characterization, he hates himself, thinks he's a waste of space. It's partially why he hangs out with misandrists.

The question becomes should Tyler and Martin fuck? Because obviously, if you were to just one to one it, they would. But I think you have to consider the differences in fantasies. The narrator (gay man) dreams up a version of himself who can have all the male brotherhood and touch, but is also capable of reaping the benefits fucking women allotts men in society. It's honrstly the most repressive part of Tyler wrt the Narrator's sexuality. The narrator (gay man) comes up with Tyler to keep Marla in his life because he can't imagine a way to just be friends with her, especially without hitting on his own insecurities.

On the other hand, lesbians tend to do things differently. Fucking men gives you more privilege in society. But it also opens you up to tons of abuse from men. Many lesbians may closet themselves but dream instead of being free of men altogether, even if they don't dare dream about fucking women. There's different pressures. In a roundabout way, the narrator (lesbian) has Tyler to make friends with Martin, too, because Tyler is confident and forceful enough to not even entertain the idea that she should be in a relationship with the only man she's around, that she's felt any interest in.

So, I wouldn't have them fuck. I think Martin and Tyler would have a bit of a toxic, lets get fucked up together thing, Tyler probably loves to make Martin worse. Tyler likes seeing a man potentially actually have an internal sense of self capable of guilt and remorse. Martin likes being told he's a piece of shit. I also think there would be some sympathy, because:

I think the only reason he would be even vaguely allowed to hang around would be if he was gay, which is something of a departure from Marla's character — but I think, given that theyre not sexually entertwinned anymore, it's okay to let something like the strange relationship between gay men and lesbians stand in the slot for "complicated relationship."

And Marla has breast cancer scares, and it's the 90s, so I think you can imagine what scares a gay Martin has. I think, having Martin would add nuance to the representation of men, in female fight club. Men don't just hurt women, they hurt men too, especially gay men, and the scales are much different but I think the narrator and Tyler would see something kindred in that, in the way they wouldn't if he was just another human buttwipe of a man. Having Martin be a human buttwipe just doesn't work in the way Marla does, so they've got to have some other kindred thing.

So overall:

-hangs around like a stray cat

-gay, probably had a lot of bad shit happen to him

-narrator resents him so bad. still goes with him to the sex health clinic

-Tyler hangs out with him and they bemoan the shit men get away with. They make lists of men who should be gunned down at the first opportunity. They get drunk and stupid and the narrator is insanely jealous someone gets to have comraderie with Tyler like that, wants it to just be her.

-Tyler occasionally sets Martin to cleaning the entirety of Paper Street house as reparations. This is the only way it gets cleaned above "functional". Martin doesn't really care

-Considers himself toxic human waste

-Mostly looks like a male version of Marla. Skinny enough to be anorexic, waxy, like's he's been beat up by an abusive boyfriend.

-Doesn't do overtly feminine things really — just sort of inherently androgynous and rides on that. He hates that guys expect him to do debasing shit just like they expect of women. This is a frequent Tyler topic

-Does still totally have that fur/feathery looking coat though

a heads up to young people or people who've just not encountered this before but it is a very frequent and common thing for terfs and radfems to have "terfs/radfems dni" in their abouts/pinned. "dni's" are essentially useless, at best they're just meaningless virtue signaling and at worst they're actively used to hide ops bigotry

they do this specifically to lure people into a false sense of security so they can slowly feed them terf rhetoric without them noticing in order to slowly radicalize them. this is a known tactic that terfs have been using for years now. they're called crypto-terfs and they specifically hide their beliefs in order to trick people because they know that being openly a terf is not tolerated in most spaces these people will often say things like "u can use whatever pronouns and name u want, but biological sex is real" or "i support trans people but womens shelters and bathrooms need to stay afab exclusive. its just about biology" "lesbians are attracted to vaginas, u cannot be attracted to amab people and call urself a lesbian" "he/him lesbians do not exist, if u use he/him pronouns u are aligning urself with men and masculinity and cant be a lesbian" they will also often have lesbian seperatist views, this is the belief that afab lesbians do not have much in common with the wider queer community and should seperate themselves out and close in amongst themselves for protection. they have a very "us and them" mentality where they encourage distrust of other queer people, saying things like "the wider lgbtq+ community is obsessed with men. as someone who wants nothing to do with men i feel ostracized among them. the only place i feel safe is with other afab lesbians" "bi women cannot call themselves gay" "we have nothing in common with other gay women"

these things are gateway arguments that lead down a line of biological essentialist, racist, and conservative thinking and seek to normalize those thoughts and arguments in order to indoctrinate more people to their hate group. its very important to be mindful of these things and not just trust that because someone has "terfs dni" in their about/pinned/card means that they are automatically a safe person to be around and are trans inclusive/positive

Absolutely love that I'm seeing the term "afab separatists" around. For one, this is not a seperatist movement, but it's also very casually misgendering us by comparing us to lesbian separatists.

And as an aside, this was never about trans women! You people are the ones that made it about trans women! You're forcing us to talk about trans women, instead of focusing on what we actually want to talk about, which is systematic oppression by cis people.

following marie kondos advice about getting rid of things that dont spark joy and accidentally becoming a lesbian seperatist