Being a political lesbian
1980
“As a label it was simply saying that
sleeping with men was sleeping with the enemy and the phrase didn’t
necessarily mean you had relationships with women or you were massively
attracted to women. It could but didn’t necessarily, but it did mean
that you very definitely didn’t sleep with men, and you were
woman-identified. I noticed then, as now, that that’s not very helpful.
It was odd in that it defined your sexuality in terms of what you
weren’t, like straight women saying I love gay men because they’re
non-threatening, defining homosexuality in relation to heterosexuality,
not on its own terms”.
Contributed by: Trisha McCabe, 51