15 Lesbian Myths, Debunked

Forget everything you think you know about lesbians. Nowadays selection from gently sweet to possibly harmful kinds Lesbian fallacies, and despite an uptick in representation in the broader culture (allow us this moment to say a personal, primary "hi" to Reneé Kehlani) and Rap, it can feel like lesbian misconceptions aren’t losing steam. Well, not everything. Some facts stay necessary - declare much simpler, for example, that whole "being predominantly or exclusively attracted to women and women-aligned people" thing - but for some reason, figuring out as a lesbian in addition will come with a entire lot of bad information and stereotypes.

Of course, some stereotypes exist for a very good reason. Is nothing sacred anymore? Who can we trust? ! Kidding Just... However, I am fully aware that the next girl I swipe right for on Tinder might hate rainbows and think flannel is downright atrocious. Yes, proudly. I very own around 30 sets of Chat shoes likewise, and I basically possess a rainbow tattooed on my system. Personally, FREELESBIANPASSPORT XXX do I own at least 10 beautiful flannel shirts?

Lesbians may share a label and a letter in the LGBTQIA+ acronym, but most of us couldn’t be more splendidly different from one another. So, are some of the most prolonged misconceptions about lesbians here. Study up, because we're about to turn those perspectives around. Of course, we can’t really hear that kind of ignorance over the blare of Tegan and Sara’s greatest hits while Carol plays in the background - wink wink -but we know it’s tright here, and we're demanding change. It’s (by far) time the world acrecognizeledges how diverse lesbians and our culture can be instead of lumping us into a few key words and cultural icons.

Lesbian myth #15: We’re looking at you in the locker room. To shower Maybe. Possibly to place on some deodorant. At the most, we might inquire you where you acquired your lovely however useful exercise garments, but that’s about as crazy as it might get. Well, here’s some news for you: we’re in the locker room to change clothes.

No matter how far we progress as a society, there are always going to be those people who feel "uncomfortable" sharing a locker room with queer folks. Certainly definitely not to switch you to the untamed techniques of women-lovin’.

Lesbian myth #14: You can identify us by our flannel.

Careful with this one. Take it from someone who’s made this error herself - flannel does not equal lesbian. You can inquire that young lady using an lovely flannel t-shirt to refreshments, but you might finish up with a lovely heterosexual friend instead merely. Flannel possesses a second every some other fall months fundamentally, and in a straight line folks have a tendency to get all over it only as very much as we lesbians happen to be.

Lesbian myth #13: We all love The L Word. Some of us genuinely don’p possibly like it. We’deb been recently slowly but surely drifting from this getting the thought leisure infatuation of all lesbians apart, but Era Queen happened then. But shhh, we can’t really excessive say that away...

Ol, The D Word. What we’g seriously take pleasure in will be some even more completely recognized, interesting queer cartoon figures inside just about all types involving Television and even motion pictures indicates. Personally, I’ve ended up extra of a Sth of No place woman myself generally, but here’s the thing - all lesbians don’t need to watch or identify with a show exclusively about lesbians. Honestly, give us as many as possible, but The L Expression is not the be all and end all of our televis definitelyion queues.

Lesbian myth #12: We’re all super athletic. Gentlepeople and Ladies, do not feel like a failure because you can’t hit a home run or literally connect your bat to a ball under any circumstance. There’t a globe of things for us to end up being great at out there, and it’s not always gonna be sports. They put the ball on a string in middle school and I still couldn’t hit it.

Let me tell you how bad I am at softball.

Lesbian myth #11: We’re in love with every woman and women-aligned person we’ve ever met.

In certain women and femme-heavy circles, when someone comes out as a lesbian, there’s a belief that said lesbian surely must be in love with actuallyy woman and girl-aimed person in that group. In other words, because your friend told you they’re a lesbian, they possess a key most likely, lesbian-lust motivation for sharing this news with you specifically, right?

Let’s make this simple. Having the freedom to talk in this article on part of all lesbians, this is all we really want to happen when we come out to you: we want you to know how we identify. That’s it. You’re on a mighty high horse if you think your lesbian friend, by sheer automatic truth of their being a lesbian, will be in love with you.

Lesbian myth #10. We have major problems with boys. If you’re good with that, so are we. If you’re a man, pretty much the only universal truth about lesbians’ attitudes toward you is that we probably don’t want to make out with you. A lot of folks aren’p good just.

Beware tle "man-hating lesbians! Some men aren’t the best, of course, but are plenty of women and folks of literally all genders neither. " Donate your ejaculate and we may forever located completely without you! I joke, I laugh. Despite the simple fact we frequently obtain pretty charged of this significantly, we’re, on the whole, fine with dudes perfectly.

Lesbian myth #9: Every lesbian couple "U-Hauls" immediately. And yes, we can side-eye our friends who are "U-hauling" while shaking our fists a bit at the stereotype coming true, because this really, seriously, doesn't happen to everyone. Sure, we see a lot of our friends moving in after a few dates and wonder if we're next, but a great deal of lesbian married couples are available with two pieces of flat tips. The official U-Haul X (then Twitter) account even acknowledged that when marriage equality was legalized.

Let’s be real: "U-hauling" (or moving in together instantly) certainly can be a thing. We can date and turn out to be just as afraid of commitment as anyone else!

Lesbian myth #8. We are able to’capital t understand our sexuality without appearing or perhaps courting in a good connection.

Oddly, tlere are also people in the world who might try to fight your sexuality if you’re a woman or woman-aligned person who’s never been in a relationship with a woman or woman-aligned person, or if you don’t date. In short: you just know. And you definitely shouldn't feel pressured to date simply because you need to "defend" your identity. "But how do you really know you're a lesbian?" That’h a fun concern to have inquired usually. It’s perfectly possible to know who you’re attracted to without being wrapped in a person of that gender’s arms. If you're still figuring it out, you also shouldn't have to defend your journey or personal life to anyone.

Lesbian myth #7: Because we’re lesbians, that means we have everything in the sex and dating realm figured out. Lesbians still deal with misogyny in dating and our own host of dating and sex challenges.

How about a big "nope" to this one. You may think you’re paying lesbians a compliment by insisting we’ve got it all figured out and are "better off without men" - or, in a common expression heard from cishet women, that you "wish you could be us." But the reality isn’t that cut and dry, and seemingly-positive stereotypes about lesbians will be stereotypes even now.

Lesbian myth #6. Lesbian sex isn’t as valid as cis making love involving a penis and vagina. Let me assure you; we’ve got this under control.

Wow, do my cishet friends have a lot of questions about lesbian sex. We want for nothing. As tellingly Just, the study found that orgasming during sex is important to both cishet women and lesbians equally. Hell, we might be having a lot more fun than you still. That scholarly review observed that lesbians survey bigger ejaculation targets from making love, greater "orgasm goal pursuit,even more clitoral stimulation during making love ", and total extra ejaculations than cishet ladies. Now, a 2024 research posted in Public Individuality and Psychological Research possesses added in considerably more situation, showing the difference could have to do with sexual scripts - or, what people expect to happen in a sexual encounter. Consider: Research has long shown that lesbians have more orgasms than cishet women without being able to pinpoint why.

I hate to rub it in, but to those folks out there who are worried that lesbian sex isn’t all it can be and more: please find other things to worry about.

Lesbian myth #5: We’re all oversexed. It’s super common for lesbians to be fetishized, something that porn created for and by straight viewers doesn’t help. In short, no matter what content made for the straight gaze has told you, lesbians don’testosterone levels as a party have got higher love-making turns than anyone else. - have more orgasms than cishet women. That doesn’t mean we’re all jumping to have got sex left and right! The reality is that, like all human beings, people who are lesbians possess a whole range of varying making love drives, and individual people’s sex drives change with stages and hormones of life, too.

Okay, hence as we merely protected, lesbians do - per scientific studies!

Lesbian myth #4: We’re all undersexed. That makes sense! For as much fetishization as lesbians tend to deal with, we also have to deal with the "lesbian bed death" myth - or, that long-term lesbian couples experience greater sexual activity decline than straight couples. The reality can be that two lesbians in a multi-year or also multi-decade romantic relationship happen to be proceeding to knowledge dry out spells, the same as couples of any gender identity and sexual orientation combination do.

It’s funny how lesbian myths can outright contradict themselves, however both misconception editions merely, you know, continue to exist. Saying that lesbians have less sex over time than others just isn’t true, we’re (not) sorry to tell you.

Lesbian myth #3: Because someone identifies as a lesbian, that means you know their gender identity. In keeping with the language we’ve been using here, lesbians are attracted, or primarily exclusively, to women and woman-aligned people. You can be non-binary and identify as a lesbian also! They may intersect and overlap in ways specific to each individual person, but one - sexual orientation - has to do with which gender or genders you’re attracted to and the other - gender identity - features to do with your own sense of what your personal gender is. See? Not the same. While lesbianism is commonly associated with cis females being attracted to cis women, that’s not all that it is. None of that inherently reveals information about the gender identity of the person who’s identifying as a lesbian.

Repeat after us: Sexual orientation and male or female identity are not the same thing.

Lesbian myth #2: We’re all TERFs. According to the study’s author: "While TERFs are not always lesbians, lesbians are assumed to make up a large proportion of TERFs…

Building off our previous point, it’s time we tackle this lesbian myth head-on. current ideologies within the media are allowing for the slippage between the terms ‘lesbian,’ ‘feminist,‘TERFs and ’.’ Some scholars will be suggesting that equating lesbian identities with transphobia and trans exclusion is but a new form of lesbia goodn marginalization." The author adds that "through the voices of lesbians across the United States, I illustrate how many lesbians despise TERF ideology and argue that lesbians must stand in solidarity with trans people in the fight for social justice." To that we say: heard. It’s unfortunately, for demonstrated reason, come to be widespread to find the stated term "lesbian" manufactured synonymous with TERFs, or trans-exclusionary radical feminists. A 2024 article published in the National Library of Medicine looked at this conflation in detail and says everything we think needs to said here.

Lesbian myth #1: We all fit into the butch or femme dichotomy. Oftentimes tags like butch and femme will need not really implement at all, of the time and at the stop, we’re also all of adorable young ladies with fantastic haircuts only. But don’t go around assuming labels - or assuming anyone’s specific gender identity - based on style or stereotypes. Of course, a lot of lesbians do identify under "femme" or "butch" labels, and there’s no difficulty with that at all. Girls with long hair can be butch! Now, however, those lines can be and are confused often.

Especially in previous decades, tle butch or femme dichotomy was a pretty substantial part of lesbian culture (you can add Stone Butch Blues to your reading list for more information). Short haired girls can be femme!