My response from Dirt's Blog: Transition is never inevitable, and from me: How to love your Butch Dyke FEMALE Body/Mind/Spirit

I really have to share about this.
My current partner, who is Butch, once she got online, and began to flirt with/cyber other Butch on Butches, so many of them were 10 years or more her junior, were flirting with gender, genderqueering, and then considering transitioning, rather than owning up to the beautiful/handsome WOMEN they are, as Butch Dykes, so eager and ready to trade in their femaleness, kept asking her when SHE was going to transition, ect. ect. ect.
And my partner(before we met) was a LONGTERM BUTCH DYKE OF AT LEAST 15 YEARS OUT!

It was almost like a cult, they draw you in, tell you what you want to hear, 'love bomb' you, and/or flirt with you, acknowledge you as a Butch in ways you've never heard before, but like ALL cults there is a heavy price to pay...

It fucked with her head so bad, she ALMOST considered transitioning, she had packers, and dildos galore, packing everyday with either softies or hardies, even to work, ect. ect. ect, cuz all the rest were doing the same.....that out of all this, she decided not to date anyone for two years so she could figure out where she was at with all this.

This questioning NEVER happened to her UNTIL she got online. Once she got online, the bombardment and pressure to transition or genderqueer was enormous, just like so many of the young ones are getting today, rather than the pride I got through Dykes in the Lesbian movement, where we were going to change the world, as Amazons, as Warriors as "an army of lovers can never fail", an old Lesbian saying that was new back then, well sadly, we HAVE failed. Even though back then what with our new institutions we were quickly creating, lesbian music recording companies, bookstores, events, festivals, printing presses, ect. ect..our OWN cultural institutions BY AND FOR OURSELVES......so many of them gone, gone, gone. Other Butches taught me PRIDE IN BEING FEMALE, a different KIND of Female, with power and strength, and holding our space as the Warriors for Women, the take no bullshit no man is gonna tell me what to do!

Now instead, they're becoming 'men'. That Dyke Female pride has been sadly lost.

Well, she figured out after two years of this journey she DID NOT want to have her breasts cut off, and she was PROUD to be both Butch and Female, she went back to dating both Butches and Femmes. But it was online that fucked with her head, and because she had been a longterm OUT Butch Dyke in a difficult part of the country to be out, she had more strength than most, who have NEVER been out yet as a Butch Dyke, with that kind of Female Dyke herstory...just new on their journey, and detered offcourse and caught up in the promises and excitement of the trans movement. But the price is a heavy one to pay...not just renouncing one's Femaleness, or even Dykeness, but in having one's body physically altered through painful surgeries, and then to go on hormones that do who knows what to the body in the longrun! All that just to 'fit in'?

I for one am glad, and when she met me, as a Female Identified Butch, I told her she didn't have to 'prove' any of this to me. She could put away the dildos and packers and such, and show me her Female side without fear....and we have both found the kind of match that we know these days would be very hard to find 'out there'. We celebrate our Butchness, our Femaleness, our Dykeness and ultimately our Amazon natures together....AS WOMEN. We LOVE each other's FEMALE bodies...instead of despise them, and from each other's admiration of our bodies, we learn to love our own bodies too....

I'm so glad this woman came to her senses through reading your blogs Dirt.
-In Butch DykeAmazon Sisterhood,
-MasterAmazon

Reply to Dirt's post on the 7 different questions of what Butches feel at a young age

I rejected dolls at age 7, dresses by age 10, never wanted to marry a man or have children and knew this by age 12, and always fought with my parents that I wasn't a 'girl', meaning feminine,frilly, ect. but knew I wasn't a boy either when they'd say that, so I'd say I was 'an alien from outer space' when they asked what I was...(being the Trekker(Star Trek fanatic) that I am).


I did play with the boys cuz the girls games were stupid, boring and housewifey....but I DID connect with particular Greek Goddesses who left the men's world to live in the woods, amongst only other women in independence and freedom...

And yes, I did always imagine myself in the men's/boys roles cuz the girls roles were helpless nitwits who couldn't defend or take care of themselves without some man's/boy's help.

I never had a big deal about the bathroom thing, cuz I didn't want to share that with boys, they were the enemy and mean to me cuz I didn't 'fit in'. Always preferred pants and androgynous clothes to anything 'girly'. Yes, I didn't like developing breasts, refused for several years to wear bras(and mostly don't anymore anyway), but was teased mercilessly by feminine girls in P.E. for not wearing them, till finally I succumbed so I could be left alone, and also pressure from my mother and grandmother to wear them.

Fortunately, in puberty, I got into martial arts at age 14, which became my lifelong niche as a young Amazon, and I could 'kick ass', and no longer got picked on once I acquired some skills and much greater athletic ability as a result. The martial arts gave me a power, strength and self-confidence that many other teenagers, girls and women lacked. It gave me purpose and pride in my body and it's growing strength. This was at a time not many women were doing martial arts..some, but not many.

I LOVED that men had one weakness, despite their superior strength, which of course I envied...that one kick to their nuts could put them on their knees!
-MasterAmazon

Pressures/Expectations as a Butch Dyke

This is from my answer to the above question on The Butch Project, what Pressures/Expectations do we experience as Butches in our lives?

M.A.'s answer: There's always the pressures to 'femme up' or otherwise conform, or not be TOO obviously Butch and proud, even amongst Lesbians sometimes, and then the subtle Butch and Lesbian baiting in the outside world. The worst is in the world of work, which is why I chose a profession where I can naturally wear Butch clothing. It doesn't really match my temperament inside, but I wanted a profession where I could dress and be Butch without having to 'femme up' in any way, and still get paid well while working. I didn't count on having to work mostly with just men, and rarely women, and all the sexism, homophobia, and racism that goes with my trade or being in the trades. And that being a woman, and on top of that a big, bad, out and obvious Butch Dyke female of size like myself would end up discriminated against in trying to get on a job, or stay on a job for any length of time because of size, sex, sexual orientation discrimination both obvious and subtle with the hetero white men who rule the trade and the hiring.

Still, this is who I am, who I've been for 30 years, and beyond..and I wouldn't be any other way than in being a proud Butch DykeAmazon!

As far as within the community, there's alot of pressure to date mostly or exclusively Femmes, and frankly I prefer to partner with other Butches and have married my Butch partner. I'm turned onto another Butch who has the similar qualities in herself and completely understands intimately the struggle that I have....Butch on Butch has always been my native sexuality, with a few Femme exceptions...and what I hate the most is other Butches treating those of us who are Butch on Butch like we're 'less than' or not REAL Butches because we prefer other Butches primarily.