It seems lesbian identity has become something of a cause célèbre for the global right, providing pseudo-progressive cover to anti-trans hate. Lesbians, the logic runs, are women who are exclusively sexually attracted to other women, and therefore uniquely clear-sighted about what the most important and defining part of any woman is: the pussy.
I feel like they often deny their own oppression in order to do it.
My suspicion is that they’re not denying their own oppression, but are in fact acutely aware of it, and are either lashing out at others in order to win approval from their oppressors (the same way sometimes the victim of bullying will start bullying others so the bullies become their friends), or they are misplacing blame for their oppression. The thing that made me suspect this are people like JK Rowling, who are themselves the victims of abuse at the hands of cis men, and they’re incorrectly perceiving trans women as being cis men looking to perpetuate further abuse instead of recognising that trans women are not their enemies but are in fact potential allies. Although Rowling is a straight woman, I can well believe that lesbian women can fall into the same line of thinking if they’ve had bad experiences with men: they simply cannot believe that someone could have another motive for transitioning to female other than creeping on lesbians. They end up with right wing beliefs because the right is better at offering simple black and white solutions to problems, and better at finding a target to blame, which is appealing to those who are hurt, angry, and scared.
My suspicion is that they’re not denying their own oppression, but are in fact acutely aware of it, and are either lashing out at others in order to win approval from their oppressors (the same way sometimes the victim of bullying will start bullying others so the bullies become their friends), or they are misplacing blame for their oppression. The thing that made me suspect this are people like JK Rowling, who are themselves the victims of abuse at the hands of cis men, and they’re incorrectly perceiving trans women as being cis men looking to perpetuate further abuse instead of recognising that trans women are not their enemies but are in fact potential allies. Although Rowling is a straight woman, I can well believe that lesbian women can fall into the same line of thinking if they’ve had bad experiences with men: they simply cannot believe that someone could have another motive for transitioning to female other than creeping on lesbians. They end up with right wing beliefs because the right is better at offering simple black and white solutions to problems, and better at finding a target to blame, which is appealing to those who are hurt, angry, and scared.