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Femme and butch don't "belong to lesbians" you transphobic nerds. Femme and butch belong to the queer working-class. Thread.
1. Lesbian Butch/Femme So yes: the cultural dominant mainly associates "femme" and "butch" with lesbianism. It is, in my view, the most established facet of lesbian culture. And it belongs to working-class lesbians. Classic femme: Joan Nestle. Classic butch: Leslie Feinberg.pic.twitter.com/Wt3WY5I5Tv
1.a: Early History I guess the origin of "butch"/"femme" & lesbian butch/femme bar culture around 1945, but no one knows. My private analysis is that once all the men were off in foreign countries shooting each other with guns, lesbians got a lot more public about getting laid.pic.twitter.com/2RNKk4Hb3G
However, relationships which at least *look* butch/femme -- speaking curtly, a mannish woman with a womanish woman -- seem essentially universal. Granting sparsity of data, clearly they exceed class and culture and occur throughout history.pic.twitter.com/C3VbUULLQV
The words "butch" and "femme" arose in urban contexts. Yes, we all know Radclyffe Hall, but she classed herself as an "invert" and lacked lesbian community. Early self-designated butches and femmes were overwhelmingly poor, especially Black or Jewish, often New Yorkers.
One of the major locations where "butch/femme" language arose was the city prison system. This part is not nice history -- on surface it suggests pretty ruthless sexual hierarchy, as well as rape. But it also suggests forging love and companionship through profound trauma.
1.b: Feminist Backlash So, (some) feminists have hated butch/femme lesbian couples since there was feminism. For instance, it's in *The Second Sex*, when de Beauvoir (herself bisexual) embracingly types lesbian butches as misogynists and lesbian femmes as abused heterosexuals.pic.twitter.com/N5wlWi2ARa
As political lesbianism emerged, lesbianism became idealized as "eroticized equality." This concept looms large in highbrow lesbian artmaking, such as Sciamma's recent *Portrait of a Lady on Fire*. But butch/femme couplings are specifically lesbianism as *eroticized difference*.pic.twitter.com/MkT47cCGiz
Through lesbian feminism and specifically the feminist critique of lesbianism, butch/femme entered the historical record in a clear way. It did this because wealthy white gentile women were using these words regularly, to attack. Examples: https://old.reddit.com/r/GenderCynical/comments/9vjbgz/a_small_collection_of_lerfs_and_lesbian_advocates/ …
1.c: Butch/Femme Reasoning With Gay Liberation, butch/femme lesbian culture started to answer back. They did this partly through continued practice, roughly: butches making great art, repping drag, starting Stonewall; femmes caretaking history & community-building.
Some Gay Libbers wrote as centrists, as in the infamous essay by Rita Lepore, *The Butch/Femme Question*. Here butch/femme is different enough from heterosexuality to not be violent, but not so different it's not still sexy. A real Goldilocks situation.pic.twitter.com/tA55v7aU9O
I have the sociologist's eye that Lepore tried to dismiss. Butches *could* well be their stereotype in some communities: more likely to abuse substances or their partners. Or vice-versa. Femmes are more often sex workers, as Leslie so movingly detailed in *Stone Butch Blues*.pic.twitter.com/wBULawMay4
This would not mean even the most violent butch/femme relationships mimic heterosexuality. Butch/femme relationships are lesbian and therefore mimic lesbianism; I accept this unwaveringly. To me the feminist trivialization of SSDV stains feminist practice irreparably.pic.twitter.com/qq8L5Jp53d
2. Transgender Butch & Femme Right, so, "butch" and "femme" have a very very queer lineage, in the urban working class. They are popularized gender positions specific from that milieu and have never been exclusive to lesbians or even necessarily open to all of them.
2.a. Transgender Butch Yeah, there are trans butches. For one, the term "butch queen" was thrown around in 80s ballroom & earlier for gay men, who performed in a variety of categories; today we might call them something like genderqueer. Noun "butch" was more for masc women.pic.twitter.com/Y6UXmQCSUT
Otherwise, just as those major lesbian terms "femme" and "butch" developed with gay male & trans culture, the word "trans" itself grew with lesbian culture. Some lesbians, especially butches, felt the appellation applied. Sex identity is only one barrier of gender, after all.
The trans butch category is controversial. Insofar as they are women I am happy to be trans women with them. Stormé DeLarverie was as good as trans butch; Leslie Feinberg self-declared as such; Jack Halberstam discussed it at length & @butchanarchy is a criminally great follow.pic.twitter.com/lAg7s7APv8
2.b. Transgender Femme Trans women (especially of color) have been self-describing as femme pretty much since lesbians have, end of. They did this because they shared a common community and language. We are less on record because there were far fewer of us. Ex. 1970:pic.twitter.com/bolRKM6k8g
Unlike drag, ballroom distinguished pretty clearly between a "butch queen" and a "femme queen." Trans women were femme in this space. Related, "kiki," the term used for "just having fun," is both what femme/butch queens and lesbians call(ed) youngins, who "haven't decided."pic.twitter.com/KyrRAs1ivH
3. Femme Solidarity In 2000s & 10s especially there was a serious push for "femme" as a kind of shared queer subjectivity from which to develop politics. This means trans & lesbian femmes building space together as femmes. Amazing thread from Cyree here: https://twitter.com/cyreejarelle/status/1174017362254807045 …
That thread really says it all (I still think about it like once a week) but to reiterate: "femme" has a very queer lineage. I have added that this lineage is working-class.
Occasionally other LGBT people (like me -- I was raised middle-class) use the term to self-describe if we respect because we have been gifted great meaning in it. Rarely it extends to unusual femininity: "fat femme" or "femme fatale." But the common use is working-class queer.
There's always more to think about -- butch solidarity has never been as much of a thing & it's fascinating why -- but I finished my piece. When we use language, we inherit generations of cognitive labor. Respect your queer inheritance or get out.
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