Now Greg, I think it’s only fitting
that your final injection is
administered by that slut of a
girlfriend of yours. This is the first
time she’s seen you since I had you
both worked on. I hope she likes
the new you.
This injection contains the last of
your hormone shots. They’ve done
such a wonderful job to your body
haven’t they?
You’re now ready for the training
programme. I’m looking forward to
breaking you both in. I’ve always
wanted my own pair of rubber maids
around the house. It’s going to be
fantastic watching you both
humiliated like that. Now, here comes
that needle….
I was visiting FemmeFluff’s blog earlier this week, and she had a post about this documentary. I had never heard about it before, so I decided to click the Amazon link and the YouTube links to see what the documentary was about. While watching the clips that are on YouTube, I was totally drawn in. I absolutely love the intimacy between these two. They seem so comfortable, so connected to one another.
Part of the documentary deals with the sexual connection between the two. I haven’t seen the complete video, so I can’t talk on that aspect, but what I can say is that I want to see more of their kind of relationship. I hear a lot of lesbians talk about ‘the sex”! Sex is all good, but once you have that orgasm, you have to have a foundation to stand on. There has to be more to the relationship than the fact that she can make you scream!
I will come back and post my thoughts on the movie once I see it in its entirety. If you have seen it, or plan to see it, please let me know your thoughts.
“On October 23, 2002, a column about women’s hockey caught my eye. Hayley Wickenheiser, one of the stars in the Canadian women’s hockey firmament, is having difficulty finding a team to play on because of institutional rules about playing with men. One comment in particular was noteworthy:
“There is, and long has been, a simmering hostility against women in hockey. The more boorish attitude is… that they’re just a bunch of lesbians anyway — a sad prejudice only reinforced when former hockey Olympian Nancy Drolet married her partner, Nathalie, in a Quebec civil ceremony.”
Now, I appreciate (I think) the spirit in which that was written. The writer is commenting on the various types of official and unofficial discouragement women face when trying to play sports, especially sports which aren’t ladylike. However, there is a piece which is missing here, and it has to do with that L-word which everyone seemed to like to say a few years ago when Ellen was big news.
One of my previous workout partners, a former hockey and national-level softball player, told me that as she was growing up in rural Canada, the stigma of lesbianism in sports was one which all the athletes and coaches openly rejected. Which meant that the players and coaches who actually were lesbians (like my friend) had to stay in the closet and keep their dykey mouths shut. Rejecting the stereotype of athletic women as a bunch of lesbians is one thing, but often, doing so with such unequivocal enthusiasm merely serves to perpetuate the homophobia that constrains women’s activities. The righteously indignant battle cry of “We’re not lesbians!” contains the implicit message, “Cause lesbians are bad!”
Think about it a bit more. Why are lesbians seen as bad in this context? Because they are thought to transgress gender norms. They are supposedly masculine, butchy, unfeminine, aggressive, hairy, etc., basically everything good girls are not. So, the message is not only that women who play sports are lesbians, but since lesbians are masculine, then women who play sports are masculine. Good girls, then, do not play sports. QED. Homophobia does a nice little tango with sexist norms, and the end result is that the straight girls have to practically get married on the field to prove their heterosexuality, and the queer girls are made to feel ashamed for letting down the team. Who the hell cares if Nancy marries Nathalie? Why is it their responsibility not to “reinforce a sad prejudice”? The people reinforcing the sad prejudice are the ones who are discouraging girls from playing sports, not the dykes who are brave enough to be themselves.
It’s time to stop pushing sportdykes into the closet just to make everyone feel better about their femininity. It’s time to stop protesting too much, to stop worrying about “our image” and our connection to athletes who happen to be queer. Lesbian issues are women’s issues, and intolerance against some hurts all of us. It’s time to start saying, “Hell yes, some of us are lesbians, and that’s okay!””
My weekend was taken up by the Lesbian Lives Conference XVIII which ran from Friday 19th to Saturday 20th. People came from all over the world to speak and share their experiences.
Friday morning began with the writer being late and rushing into the nearest session facilitated by Malia (Mary) L McCarrick and happened to be a writing workshop (ah!) based on the topic of identity. The morning structured around the Cass Identity Model. From free-style writing, to brain storming to describing the events that made up the stages of identity reconciliation, this session brought with it transformative fun with the added delight of having something to work on later!
The lunch-time session attended consisted of three speakers:
(1) Kym Bird, York University,UK Thrills, Crises and Climaxes: Melodrama and Lesbianism in Early Canadian Women’s Drama
(2) Chris Roulston, University of Western Ontario, Canada Interpreting Lesbian Desire in the Codrington Divorce Trial of 1864
This was an interesting investigation into the world of the court systems where lesbian relationships have rarely been given the coverage:
(3) Temma Berg, Gettysburg College, USA
An Im/Modest Proposal: Anne Lister, Emily Brontë and the Writing of Shirley
A joyous traipse through the potential lesbian identities of women connected with the Brontë sisters. Just when one thought it was the end of a thought… the speaker went forward into another tract pulling from the text more codes, more information and more possibilities than imagined! This is another book for the ‘Will Read’ list.
The evening session was about Young Lesbian Lives:
(1) Petruta Tatulescu, Ruprecht-Karls-University, Germany Lesbian Lives at Boarding Schools
As a former inmate of a boarding school the writer was intrigued by this topic and what would come of this subject. The paper was a comparison of two films, Mädchen in Uniform und Loving Annabelle. Unfortunately time ran out and the speaker did not get to finish her paper.
(2) Leslie Sherlock, Trinity College, Dublin, Ireland To Inclusively and Beyond! : A Sweden/Ireland Dialogue on LGBT Inclusion in Sex/uality Education
This was a very important presentation for this writer given the nature of the topic, the scope of the work and the interesting process of comparisons of the two countries in terms of sexuality information and education.
(3) Anne Rudolph, Linkoping University, Sweden ‘Can Lesbians Get Sexually Transmitted Infections’?; Unpacking the Question
Sex! Finally there was something ’sticky’ said on this topic. Anne’s presentation was brilliant: informative and inspiring covering a topic which is not talked about enough.
Evening: Keynote Special Emma Donoghue
The room was packed, there to listen to Emma speak about her news book: Inseparable: Desire between Women in Literature. The journey was hhilarious, a tour through the dodgy lesbian literature of the centuries. She is a fantastic speaker: entertaining, funny and eloquent as she brought us through the ideas of the book. Another one for the list!
If you have any opinions or information or simply want to comment, please do.
The Exam is a project being co-ordinating by the Ultimate Holding Company as part of this year’s Queer Up North festival, and they are looking for volunteers to join their examination board.
If you are interested in art and performance this is the perfect opportunity to participate in a unique interactive art project and piece of social research – focused on queer history and culture. The main event premiering to the public on the 23rd of May 2010.
The board meets weekly on Wednesdays at a city centre art studio. For further information contact:
I’m tired of swimming in love
& drowning in her.
She’s looking for him
& I can’t find a replacement
or even a look-a-like
to fill the space she refuses to fit.
It’s in her eyes
but she has it avoid her lips,
so how can mine even travel there?
Not that there’s a need,
I know she hears it in half my words
feels it in my every touch,
why else venture to daydream,
“naked you’re still a girl.”
It’s the sex that scares her
a fear I can’t quiet
a desire I can’t embrace.
So a could be lover is trapped
in the shell of best friend;
in love with the impossible
and still seeking that replacement
or just a look-a-like,
someone else to place
the burden of my love on
and around.
I was visiting FemmeFluff’s blog earlier this week, and she had a post about this documentary. I had never heard about it before, so I decided to click the Amazon link and the YouTube links to see what the documentary was about. While watching the clips that are on YouTube, I was totally drawn in. I absolutely love the intimacy between these two. They seem so comfortable, so connected to one another.
