vikkiisagenderneutralname:
I’m femme. And I’m not strong. I’m so weak that I can barely exist, but there’s nothing wrong with that. And I don’t have an issue with my weakness being seen as feminine, because there should be nothing wrong with being weak. There’s nothing wrong with my mental illnesses that make me this weak. And maybe I’m taking this too far, but lately I’ve seen so much reinforcement of weakness being the “default setting” of femininity, and lately I’ve also been going through the most debilitating depressive episode of my life, that it really frustrates me to see so much celebration of strength with so little acceptance of weakness. Actually, NO acceptance of weakness. And this seems really fucked up when you think about the intersections of mental illness physical and mental disability within femininity. So… IDK.
There needs to be more talk about how we hurt each other when we only talk about strength and refuse to acknowledge weakness. Especially among femmes. It’s bad enough that I see this all too often with butches but with femmes it seems like we’re trying to claim that because we are feminine as far as society is concerned, we have to not have any of the negative traits associated with femininity. And it is dis/ableism when it comes to weakness. I have disabilities. I have weaknesses. I also have strengths, sure, but I do have weaknesses, too. I’m a femme and I am not always strong and amazing. Just because society claims I am automatically weak because I’m feminine doesn’t mean I have to never show weakness. The problem is with society, not my femme self.
kiriamaya:
Huh?
There was a time when I would have tried to argue this, but now the only response I can muster is just to walk away, shaking my head…
(Well, that, and to say that you can pry my pink flowery clothes and pretty fake jewelry from my cold, dead hands.)
That does seem to be the logic, yes. I wish some trans women would come get the new radical feminist version of trans women who seem intent on demonising and excluding everything that any cafab people do. It wasn’t amusing when it was cis women doing it to trans women and it’s not any more amusing with trans women doing it to trans women and other trans people. Misogyny is misogyny, y’all.
femmesandfamily:
This is a call for femmes on tumblr who are willing to serve as a mentor/guide/friend to younger/newly out/or isolated femmes.
I am looking for folks who are willing to be available for questions and conversation.
I would like this group of mentors to represent the vast array of femme identities and intersections. Trans* femmes, femmes of color, fat femmes, femmes with disabilities, femmes on the more dapper/more masculine side, working class femmes, femmes from countries other than America, and all femmes!
If you are interested in participating, please send me your blog name, your prferred name and pronoun (if you have one) and a short bio. I am going to create a page on my blog that introduces all of the mentors. I will also be giving out your information to those who request it.
If you can’t mentor but support this project, PLEASE SIGNAL BOOST.
And if you are looking for a supportive person to discuss your femme identity or life with, or just a caring person to reach out to, please request a mentor here.
THANK YOU.
This is a brilliant idea. I’m not sure I would be a good mentor but I’ll hella signal boost it.
amydentata:
Expanded from a comment I wrote on an article by Megan Evans (Huffington Post):
Not all queer women are invisible because of femme presentation. The issue is more complicated among trans women. Some trans women are singled out for violence by the straight world and the cis world because of femme presentation. For some trans women, being femme is what makes them visible. There is another group of trans women who are occasionally read as cis, and other times read as trans. Their invisibility is temporary and random. And some trans women are regularly read as cisgender.
When femme trans women are read as cis, they are doubly invisible until bureaucratic paper trails or honest talks about personal history are used against them. When their queerness is revealed, the outcome is different than when just revealing trans status.
If I am read as trans among queer people, not only is my queerness questioned, but my femme-ness is questioned as well. My body is coded as “male”. I’m written off as “androgynous” unless I go over-the-top in my femininity. Even then, I am granted a segregated version of “femme”, banned from the hallowed halls of cis presentation, written off as a cheap imitation or an amusing oddity.
When I’m read as cis, none of this happens. My experience becomes that of the cis “femme invisibility” narrative. But I mentally start the countdown clock to when something comes up in conversation revealing my trans status. At which point cis people immediately change how they react to my presence. I’m invisible no longer, and in their eyes, femme no longer.
My dating issues aren’t just about being invisible to other queer women. I am also denied my womanhood. Instead of being overlooked like I don’t belong, some lesbians make the case that I literally don’t belong at all. I’m not just an outlier, I’m an impostor.
This varies from person to person, and trans status isn’t the only thing that affects how femmes are read by others. I’m disabled, and this changes how others perceive my femme-ness as well.
What intersections have you encountered between femme identity and trans status? What else affects how you, as a femme, are read by others?
I don’t have anything to add to this at the moment. It’s something I’ll have to think about since I’m not a trans woman, but I am a trans femme.
femmesandfamily:
I feel like that needed noting.
So true. And for some of us they skip hand in hand down the street together.
femmesandfamily:
But why is it that masculine presenting queer folks writing about femmes get far more attention than femmes writing about femmes?
Like, I am 99% sure more people know the femmes in Leslie Feinberg’s work than the autobiographical femme narratives in Minnie Bruce Pratt’s work.
grr
This. Femmes are objectified. We are supposed to be passive, silent objects for butches and other masculine people to project meaning onto, not to have meaning or voices of our own.
