Butch Wonders
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Why I Identify As Butch

5/30/2011

16 Comments

 
For some queer women, “butch” means short hair and sensible shoes.  For others, it means sexual dominance.  For still others, it’s an attitude or a way of life.  To paraphrase former Supreme Court Justice Potter Stewart’s famous take on pornography, the collective wisdom on defining butchness can be boiled down no further than: “I know it when I see it.”  So why bother to identify as “butch” at all if there are so many possible definitions? 

My DGF argues that it’s pointless to label one's self (ironic that she’s dating someone whose blog does exactly that, eh?), but I disagree.  When I first came out, I was scared of the word "butch."  I thought it meant that I wanted to be a man (I don’t), or that I could fix cars (I can’t), or that I’m attracted to femmes (I’m not).  But since then, I’ve come to embrace the word "butch."  Here are five reasons why:

1. Identifying as butch made me feel less deviant.  Instead of seeing myself as "failing" at being a woman, I could see myself "succeeding" at being a different kind of woman.  I could finally put a name to my collection of “defects”: wearing cargo pants, feeling like an alien every time I opened a women’s magazine, or finding it inexplicably crucial that I learn to tie a tie.  Viewed through this lens, countless moments of frustration and discomfort suddenly made sense.  Before identifying as butch, I had a collection of random dots; when I connected them, they finally made a picture.

2. I wasn’t alone.  Putting a name to my masculine-of-center femininity allowed me to identify others with similar traits--most importantly, to find others whose experiences echoed mine.  In some fundamental respect, there were people like me.  Even before I had butch buddies of my own, simply knowing that other butches existed made me feel less alone.

3. It helped develop my fashion sense.  Wearing women’s clothes made me feel like I was in drag.  This was part of the "defectiveness" I mention above; I just wasn't "doing" attractiveness properly.  But "butch" put a name to my style and categorized me as a possible recipient of others' sexual interest (though not my DXH's) even if I dressed as I wanted to!  Clothes became a source of fun rather than frustration once I realized I could be myself and look attractive in some recognized "sense" (albeit not a conventional one).  These days, I even enjoy shopping with my girlier female friends for their clothes, because I feel zero pressure to look like them.

4. It helped me define my attraction to others.  I spent a long time believing that if I wasn’t attracted to “feminine” women, I couldn’t be a lesbian.  If Rachel Maddow made me swoon, but Rachel McAdams left me cold, I was attracted to masculine people...  So, I reasoned, I was actually straight.  (This reasoning may strike some of you as silly, but I performed all kinds of mental gymnastics to convince myself I wasn’t gay.)  Recognizing “butch” as a category showed me that there was a common denominator among the objects of my attraction.  Yes, I was attracted to women--specifically, women of a certain type.  This helped me come to terms with my sexual orientation.

5. It gave me a useful vocabulary.  "Butch" is a great shorthand to express the idea of "a chick who looks sort of, but not really, like a dude," which was frequently something I wanted to express.  The term also came with useful attendant vocabulary, such as "bro date" (hanging out with a platonic buddy who also sort of, but not really, looks like a dude), "boi" (a queer woman who looks like a gay male high schooler) and "soft butch" (somewhere between androgynous and butch, which I studiously practiced through online use of the phrase, "soft butch seeks same").

Theoretically, I didn't need to identify as "butch" to accomplish any of this.  And maybe if I had been more confident, I wouldn't have.  But we are social creatures, and the word "butch" validated aspects of me that had never felt valid.  Ironically, putting a label on myself was pretty darn liberating. 
16 Comments
elgee
5/30/2011 11:23:36 am

you are "such" a "good" writer. Seriously.

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medina link
5/30/2011 01:52:36 pm

I love this post! thanks for sharing what many of us have been going thru

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tallon
5/31/2011 04:02:27 am

Really great post for numbers 1-4, #5, not so much, I don't love it when male pronouns or descriptors like bro-date, or bois are used to describe women and/or our activities. It contradicts the idea that butch is a valid form of femaleness in and of itself. Being butch has nothing to do with being male (as you know), butches aren't trying to be men or even like men, after all, men hafta crop their hair short too, what are THEY trying to be like when they do that? I submit, that butches and men (at least the ones who aren't just conforming to acceptable gender expressions), are going after the same affect, which is blatant physical power, strength, and a warrior-like spirit.

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Jen
5/31/2011 04:14:58 am

Loving your blog. I can totally relate to #1 which is why my wife just inherited all the dresses languishing in the back of the closet. Some of them were eve still vaguely stylish...

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Butch Wonders link
5/31/2011 05:24:32 am

Thanks for the comments!

@ Tallon: Yes, I know what you mean. Although, who's to say that males own a word like "boi?" It speaks to the poverty of our language (its lack of ability to describe anything but a gender binary), doesn't it, that so many of the words to describe female masculinity are tied to biological maleness? Just like we don't have a good, non-awkward gender-neutral pronoun in English, I'd argue that we don't have great vocabulary to describe butchness. So we end up co-opting these other words that, as you point out, are problematic. Then again, it also strikes me that if many males and many butches *are*, as you put it, "going after the same effect," then why would we need separate words to describe female masculinity at all? Hmm.

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maddox link
5/31/2011 01:12:39 pm

This summarizes a lot of what I've been trying to wrap my head around lately, in a very concrete way too, as I'm trying to truly make sense of the concept of Butch.

You see, I know that butch and trans are different, but it's hard to understand this when all the butch writers I've come across eventually end up identifying as trans. So I've been looking to read about someone who is not going down that path.

Aaaand there's some free writing fodder for you too. Keep it up please!

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Femma link
6/1/2011 12:46:38 am

Adore this blog. I think I may be in love ;)

-Femma

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Butch Wonders link
6/1/2011 07:38:47 am

@ Femma: Aawww, thanks. I've been liking your blog, too (let's be blogroll buddies!). Also: read your post on butches' height. Where are you living, o' you of short butch land?

@ Maddox: Wow, I totally know what you mean re: butch and trans. I think I *will* write a post about that--at least some initial thoughts--in the next week or two. So keep an eye out for it!

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Justa Notha link
6/2/2011 06:17:31 am

It's cool reading the blogs of so many butches who like other butches (I almost typed bitches, hopefully they're not that too lol!) Gives me hope for if I go all the way in that direction. (But then maybe I'd worry that I'm not butch enough?)
I tend to attract the kind of butches who recoil in horror when I mention my fondness for auto-repair & carpentry.
Fortunately the woman I'm seeing now seems to accept me as I am.
Also, coming out completely as a lesbian has actually helped me get more in touch with my femme side. I didn't realize it at the time--but a lot of how I used to dress had more to do with avoiding the male gaze than anything else. Now I no longer feel like an alien reading women's mags--although I do think some of the models may be!
@Maddox I was going to recommend this blog to you, but I see you got here first!

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South Carolina Boy link
6/3/2011 11:52:21 am

"I could finally put a name to my collection of 'defects': wearing cargo pants, feeling like an alien every time I opened a women’s magazine, or finding it inexplicably crucial that I learn to tie a tie. Viewed through this lens, countless moments of frustration and discomfort suddenly made sense. Before identifying as butch, I had a collection of random dots; when I connected them, they finally made a picture."

This is why it is so important for people who have something "variant" about us to be able to name the "defects"...I remember being young and having one wrong thing about me here. And another there. And another there. Without a schema to make it make sense, I just felt bad for how many things were "wrong" with me. To know I fit a pattern (along with other people) was comforting.

I could not get my parents to understand this when I was a teenager. "Why do you have to label yourself? Why do you have to have words to call yourself? Why can't you just be YOU?" Just because the schema they had put on me by default was invisible to them didn't mean I was a free of a schema till I applied my own...

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Empiricsen
6/5/2011 04:25:12 am

Uhm... Pardon my ignorance, but...
What does DGF stand for? Dominant girl friend is the best guess I have. I have absolutely no clue what DXF is. :(

You just made a recently self-identified butch* cry. /sarcasm Thanks a lot. /endsarcasm
but seriously... Thank you for writing this. :)

*I'm a couple months into using the label with myself. Before I used to avoid the "ugliness" of butch, by sticking with the term androgynous.

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Butch Wonders link
6/5/2011 05:16:18 am

Hi Empiricsen. Thanks for your comment. It really means a lot to me to know that someone else found this useful, and even emotionally resonant. Congrats on adopting "butch," too. :)

As for my acronyms:
DGF = Dear Girlfriend
DXH = Dear Ex-Husband

I kind of adopted these from other blogs I read in which people used DH (dear husband) or DW (dear wife) or DS (dear spouse) to illustrate their affection for these people even while blogging candidly about them.

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Rachel
8/6/2011 10:18:50 am

I guess it really never dawned on me that butches are attracted to butches. So thank you for breaking down my assumstion- I have become more enlightened. :-)

Reply
wdfortyplus
3/18/2012 02:22:27 am

"Wearing women’s clothes made me feel like I was in drag." agreed. It felt completely alien walking in a skirt. And to try and walk 'feminine' just wasn't happening. Walked more like chicken in a skirt! lol!
However, 'coming out' and in my early days of going out on the 'scene' I would dress in black trousers and a shirt. No essence of 'femininity' in sight; apart from the obvious. But for me it felt comfortable - even if I appeared like a boy!

Reply
andrea
3/24/2012 02:27:55 am

I of course respect all the comments that have been made on this topic, however as a woman that has always dated butches I do want to say this. A certain look is not what in my opinion makes a butch. Its an attitude and way of life. Yes many are male oriented, which I of course as a femme appreciate, however a look is a personal thing which gives one self identity. Peeling away the layers as to who someone really is, is quite different.

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dtanner
5/26/2012 07:58:38 am

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