Why Are We So Afraid of the “L”-Word?

If you openly define as a feminist, chances are that at one point or another you have been met – either to your face or otherwise – with the question:“So does that mean you’re a lesbian or something?”.

So often, I find women who define as feminists taking offense to being asked this question, quick to respond with a defensive negative. 

It is frustrating that there’s a prominent social idea that a woman’s sexuality is defined partly by her beliefs in gender equality. It’s frustrating that political beliefs are equated with sexuality. But the thing is, being a lesbian isn’t a bad thing. However, the tone in which we’re asked about our sexuality seems to make it something to be offended by. 

This is seriously problematic. 

Historically speaking, women have been seen as less competent socially, politcally, economically – and, yes – intellectually. This is proven by the fact that women were, at one point, not able to attend schools, were not able to vote, and were given extremely limited occupational options, if any at all. But if women in general have been seen as less competent, lesbians have had it twice as bad. 

Lesbians were seen – and in many cases, still are seen – to be so socially deviant because unlike straight women, lesbians “chose” to not marry a man, when marrying a man was the key to having any kind of social, economic or political power. (I of course put “chose” in quotations because at one point there was a wildly misinformed assumption that people actually chose their sexuality.) 

A woman making the decision to be with another woman instead of a man meant twice the perceived incompetence socially, economically and politically. Further, this meant she would not bear children – which was going against her natural calling to motherhood, obviously (*eye-roll*). This is why being pinned as a “lesbian” speaks to a lot more than just sexuality – and why the word alone has the potential to carry so much offensive weight when it’s used a certain way.

In order to sway people away from the feminist movement and feminist organizations, those against the feminist movement used what is called lesbian baiting – or, throwing the term “lesbian” in a way that is meant to be offensive at these organizations in order to dissuade people from joining their acts and missions. If an organization was deemed a “lesbian organization”, women would be less inclined to join them, even if they agreed with their mission, because they didn’t want others to think that they were lesbians. 

Isn’t that terrible? I mean, isn’t it truly terrible that we as a society ever thought that your sexuality could be so tainted that it actually became an insult to define as anything but straight? And that it became an insult when someone assumed you were anything but straight?

Being called a lesbian in a way that’s meant to be insulting isn’t harmful to the feminist movement as much as it is harmful to lesbians. By getting defensive over our sexuality, we’re allowing there to be a reason to get defensive in the first place – we’re allowing people to continue to use “lesbian” as an insult when it shouldn’t be insulting in the first place. 

We shouldn’t get defensive over being called a lesbian. If we are ashamed enough to defend ourselves when someone thinks we’re a lesbian, does that mean that lesbians should be ashamed of their sexuality?

Absolutely not. 

No one should ever feel ashamed of their sexuality, but when we use “lesbian” as an insult – or when we take “lesbian” as an insult – we’re making it seem like there is something for lesbians to feel ashamed of because of their sexuality. If someone mistakes your hair for a certain shade of brunette in dark lighting, you wouldn’t feel the need to get defensive if were actually blond. You might correct the mistake, but you wouldn’t take the mistake as an insult. 

For this reason, I propose that straight women no longer get defensive when someone asks if they are a lesbian because there is nothing to get offended by. Furthermore, I propose that when someone asks if you are a lesbian and you’re not, just don’t answer the question at all. It shouldn’t matter whether or not you’re a lesbian – what matters is that people who equate these two as being mutually exclusive social deviants change their outlook.

And that change starts with us. That starts when we stop getting offended by the question: “So, are you a lesbian?” and we start responding with:“Would it matter if I were?”

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• American University
• feminism