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Political Lesbianism is not forced lesbianism/fake lesbianism.

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[–][deleted]  (9 children)

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    [–]Innisfree 8 insightful - 1 fun8 insightful - 0 fun9 insightful - 1 fun -  (1 child)

    It is saying that the masterdoc, which is widely spread and supported by proponents of the modern theory of comphet (which is nearly indistinguishable from Rich's wishful thinking), is highly misleading and highly accessible to confused and traumatized girls and women who will likely be more harmed than helped by it.

    This is the crux of the issue and good on Strictly for starting the thread. Nobody is advocating political lesbianism here. We're trying to understand how we ended up with the issue and provoke a discussion on how to counter it. At least it seems so to me.

    [–][deleted] 6 insightful - 1 fun6 insightful - 0 fun7 insightful - 1 fun -  (0 children)

    YES. EXACTLY.

    And I feel I owe my goddamn freedom to be a lesbian to many of these women and I will always be grateful to them, even when I disagree. At least I UNDERSTAND their point and why it was important and still is to women in the most oppressed places.

    [–]lairacunda 6 insightful - 3 fun6 insightful - 2 fun7 insightful - 3 fun -  (2 children)

    Political lesbians who think people can change their sexuality have that in common with the xtian wrongwing.

    I've read some SJ and she makes a lot of good points. However, as far as I know she's not a lesbian.

    Whoever said imitation is the greatest form of flattery never dreamed of this scenario.

    [–][deleted]  (1 child)

    [deleted]

      [–]lairacunda 3 insightful - 3 fun3 insightful - 2 fun4 insightful - 3 fun -  (0 children)

      Hello.

      [–]Innisfree 5 insightful - 2 fun5 insightful - 1 fun6 insightful - 2 fun -  (0 children)

      Adrienne Rich Adrienne did create a conceptual idea (I don't even want to call it a hypothesis) that women can unlearn their attraction to men and love women instead. As far as I know, however, she did this entirely based on her own biases and absolutely zero qualified social, psychological, or scientific research went into it.

      This would explain why her 'lesbian' poetry is quite bad.

      And needless to say I agree with you especially with point 4. Thank you for a great post.

      [–][deleted] 5 insightful - 2 fun5 insightful - 1 fun6 insightful - 2 fun -  (2 children)

      THANK YOU THANK YOU THANK YOU THANK YOU.

      Without women who told women they could “choose” women, many many lesbians would never have been able to find themselves, and bisexual women, not in a world where “het” was the norm.

      “Born this way” is also a political argument that helped gay men because sodomy WAS ILLEGAL and they were being jailed. How else can they advance their cause? By saying they couldn’t choose.

      Some of us know it’s not a choice who our bodies respond to, but many people can choose, or realize THROUGH choosing out of straightness that they were GAY the whole time. It’s not so simple for many people and I understand why these movements helped and why some of the ideas are not loved now. But almost 90% of the time they are misunderstood or cherry picked.

      [–]lairacunda 5 insightful - 2 fun5 insightful - 1 fun6 insightful - 2 fun -  (0 children)

      Many people are bisexual and can indeed choose. But the GLM wasn't happening because SJ and the other political lesbians gave us all permission and modeling to walk away from heterosexuality. Homosex and sexuality had been happening underground for forever. If anything, I'd say Gay Liberation freed people from "compulsive heterosexuality" and political lesbians took their cue from the millions of LGBs who were walking away from these oppressive institutions and also modeled themselves after the lesbian community.