fempoli

I mean, how would they know? They were not socialized as women. And because they were socialized as men, they don’t listen to us. All they got is media and porn, so that’s what they base their idea of womanhood on. And we know these depictions of us are neither flattering nor true, but again, they won’t listen to us.

First of all, thanks for being respectful. People have been to quick to insult.

So I think one of the issues here is the common portrayal of femaleness and womanhood as the absence of male characteristics. Surgical removal of male genitals is not the same as having a vulva. Same way that surgically bifurcating your tongue doesn’t make you able to perceive the presence of molecules in the air through your Jacobson’s Organ like a snake.

Mor than that, being a lesbian is not simply about the absence of penis. Males love to try to define and categorize women according to whether they will fuck them or not, but being a lesbian is about being female AND being exclusively attracted to other female people, and genitals are not all that matter. Lesbians connect to other women in great part because we have the shared experience of living through the world as female. We were socialized in a similar manner. We have this non-verbal understanding that comes from years of living in a world that has certain expectations from you since you were born. And as much as it might be painful to admit that, there are some things that trans women will never understand. Trans women, being born and raised male through their formative years, have a second-hand understanding of what it is to be a woman, which leads to some really unnatractive behaviors, like forced over-the-top hyperfemininity and infantile mannerisms, as well as male-socialized behaviors they don’t even like to admit they have, like sexual entitlement, dominating posturing, talking over people, threatening violence and the complete inability of taking criticism.

Female-born people learn womanhood by being beaten over the head with it from the time we were born. From the disappointment of your father because you’re not a boy, to having your ears pierced before you’re even old enough to sit up by yourself, to having lower expectations about your potential. We were forged into womanhood, and it hurts. It break us. But it gives us a sort of resilience too, a kind of unwyelding bravery that only women have. The kind of exhausted defiance that you only get by going out every single day into a world that thinks you should be confined indoors, by coming home late at night every day knowing that if something happens to you everyone is gonna say it’s your fault. It takes a lifetime to acquire this resilient quality. Talk to a really old woman sometime, listen to her. They get to a certain age where they reach a breaking point and stop giving a shit about what anyone else thinks, and it’s amazing. This is why male supremacy has historically been afraid of old women.

Trans women, on the other hand, learn womanhood by emulating what they think women are, and this perception is invariably male-biased. Trans women want to emulate porn stars and pop divas. Never seen one of them say they learned to be a woman by watching their mother. None of them want to be one of those tired working women on the train at 9PM, sleep deprived and with sore feet, who are just leaving work and thinking that they’re gonna have to get home and make dinner and clean the kitchen and bathe the kids and then try to get some sleep to start it all over again tomorrow. No, they wanna be Beyoncé. They wanna be glamorous superstars, without realizing that there’s nothing glamorous about being a woman. And boy, they get SO pissed when you point this out. They just don’t get it, and they don’t even want to.

And this is why trans women cannot be lesbians. Not only they are not female homosexual individuals - the actual definition of what is a lesbian - but they also lack the life experience and outlook that would make them interesting to a lesbian.

I’ll leave you with a question here. Why don’t these trans women who are attracted to women date each other instead of bothering women who are clearly not interested? Why do they consider that they’re good enough for us, but they don’t consider other trans women good enough for them? Why should we settle for “uh at least there’s no dick” when they require a legit vulva in their relationship?

And why are we lesbians always the ones who have to be flexibilizing our boundaries and scuffling around to make everyone happy in detriment of our own needs and wants?

stop watching porn

stop using slurs against women

speak out against these things

refuse to laugh at sexist jokes, even when no women around

stop telling sexist jokes, even when no women around

talk about women you admire (for non-sexual reasons) to other men

refuse to participate in “rating” women

vote for representatives who will make women’s rights a priority

when you see a woman being ignored or spoken over, say, “I think she had something to say, and I would like to hear it.”

give women credit for our ideas and accomplishments, make sure to voice appreciation for women’s contributions often taken for granted

stop asking women to do menial things you can do for yourself–example, Terry Crews got himself a purse because he realized he was always asking his wife to hold things for him

if you are straight or bi, educate yourself on the female body. read the Vagina Monologues, etc..

Woman after winning a divorce

ok so now think of one native american cartoon character you know of or a sports team relating to native americans whether it’s their actual name or their team logo, or a town you live in or near with a “native” name bet a lot of these things came to you right away i bet you didn’t even have to think 

Astronaut Mae Jemison, first African-American woman in space, aboard the Shuttle Endeavour, September 1992. Note her necklace her necklace floating in the microgravity.