color-theorist:

leproblematique:

lines-and-edges:

slightmayhem:

asynca:

With my own eyes, I just saw a lesbian on twitter say she was being oppressed by asexual folks because their flag is everywhere, and it’s asexual people’s fault that lesbians are now ‘the last on the conveyor belt in the LGBT community’.

Like. Dude, if you need a scapegoat for your suffering, capitalism is right there. Institutionalized religion is also a great contender. Saying asexuals caused all your suffering because their flag is slightly older and therefore more recognisable than yours is like. my god, have a snickers. 

No. No. If they want a scapegoat, turn to the TERFs. There was a perfectly good lesbian flag that was well known in the 90s, that nobody uses anymore because the TERFs took it over. It was known and used before the ace flag was a glimmer. You want to be pissed, get pissed at the part of your own community who is trying to set up walls. Take that shit back if you want it. Use it while holding signs of trans sisterhood. You gave your flag up and are looking for recognition for a new one. That’s why your flag isn’t well recognized yet. Signed a transgender man, former part of the lesbian community for ~14 years.

You want to be pissed, get pissed at the part of your own community who is trying to set up walls.

This is so important.

We need a tag or shorthand phrase for “that thing where the TERF/SWERF/radfem crowd invades lesbian communities, makes it seem like any attack on them is an attack on the lesbian community, drinks all the punch, poops on the floor and leaves the next generation growing up without symbols or a cohesive community”, because it’s fucking happening again.

This is the older lesbian flag, the one that got grabbed by radfems /
TERFs / SWERFs and that very few anti-radfem / anti-TERF lesbians ever
made a concerted effort to reclaim. The Labrys flag:

It was created in 1999, eleven years before the creation and popularization of the ace flag. That gets thoroughly ignored, because it’s not convenient to the radfem rhetoric of ‘lesbians are the most oppressed members of the community EVER’
(uhhh…. trans women of color would like a word? Trans people in
general? I’m not even going to get into m-spec people and every study so
far showing that our parameters re: everything from rates of sexual
violence to poverty are much worse than those of both straight and gay
people, because that’s not the topic of this post).

I want to be very clear on this. When a young lesbian who’s been brainwashed by radfems says that ‘lesbians are the last on the conveyor belt in the LGBT community’, what she means is ludicrous nonsense such as this:

• all those ace pride flags? They should be lesbian pride flags instead, because under her beliefs, lesbians deserve absolute prioritization over other members of the community, on the basis of being ‘most oppressed’
  

• the community being seen as a coalition of EQUALS IN MUTUAL SOLIDARITY isn’t
  acceptable (at least not at more than shallow, declarative level),
  because acknowledging equality of marginalized orientations and refusing
  to build the community under a hierarchy is seen as ‘de-centering lesbians’

• remember what radfems actually said, in opposition to ‘queer’ as a term? ‘Queer de-centers and erases lesbians / lumps lesbians in with bisexuals and deluded men (hella transphobic code for trans women) and stops them short of naming their actual homosexuality.’ Changing the discourse to be solely about personal harm was a move of genius

• attention being given to issues that affect ace/aro people / activism for ace/aro people
  automatically takes away valuable time, valuable resources and valuable
  effort, that should have been spent on lesbian issues instead – therefore, any sort of ace/aro-centric work and the presence of ace/aro people is harmful to lesbians.

• hell, attention being given to issues that affect bi/pan people / activism
  for bi/pan people automatically takes away valuable time, valuable
  resources and valuable effort, that should have been spent on lesbian
  issues instead – therefore, any sort of bi/pan-centric work and the
  presence of bi/pan people (particularly ones that aren’t ‘SGA’) is harmful to lesbians

• insert
  the exact same thing about nonbinary / genderqueer people, about trans
  people (though most of the Usual Suspects haven’t quite gotten to the
  point of open and blatant transphobia), about intersex people (it’s my theory that this is at the base of that sudden and widespread campaign of ‘drop the I, intersex people are making their own community’, even
  in the face of many intersex people who fought like hell for their
  right to remain included and to keep the letter. Some, like @vergess, got rewarded for their effort by being called ‘pedophiles’ and being run off Tumblr)

And I could keep going! The spearhead of radfem infiltration within lesbian communities if two-fold – one, the rhetoric of ‘you are the most oppressed and any sort of attention being paid to these superfluous identities directly harms you’ and
two, the notion that radfems are the ultimate champions of lesbian
rights, the ones who will make certain that lesbians are always centered
and prioritized. That’s how you end up with large recruitment into
radfem ranks of young, inexperienced lesbians, who (naturally) feel
flattered, protected and prioritized. That’s how radfems can shield
themselves of criticism for their fuckery, by saying that any criticism
of radfem rhetoric is an direct attack on lesbians. That’s how you end
up with wankery such as ‘TERF is a slur used to demonize lesbians.’ It’s
my prediction that in several years’ time, the currently-in-use lesbian
flag (the lipstick one) will end up as much of a widespread symbol of
radfems as the older Labrys flag, in the exact same way that the other
flag was taken over.  

What’s the solution? Widespread acknowledgement that no one is owed automatic centering solely on the basis of their identity and that the community wasn’t created to serve the needs of predominantly one or two groups. Thorough education on what ‘equality’ and ‘solidarity’ actually
mean in the context of the struggle against
cis-perisex-heteronormativity and actually implementing them in
practice, rather than keeping them on as empty buzzwords.
Acknowledgement that just because one has suffered under oppression, it
doesn’t mean that others haven’t as well and that acknowledging and fighting against the oppression others deal with doesn’t lessen or ignore one’s own.

That is such a lovely flag, though. Someone please shove a trans icon on top and reclaim it as an inclusionist lesbian symbol.