Why are butch women pushing femmes around in public places? Elbowing them in pubs and shoving past? When a femme reapplies make-up, some butches say: “You’re a whore. You’ve got too much shit on your face already.”
To address these issues, a “Butch and the Lost Art of Manners” workshop was convened by Nikki and Naomi, both with more than 20 years of experience on the scene.
“Lots of things have declined – manners and chivalry,” Nikki said. “There are lots of butches who seem a bit lost in their identity.”
The theory is that butches have taken on the bravado of gangsta rap/hip hop culture.
Participant K said the new attitude is: “As long as I’m alright, I don’t have to look after anyone else.”
“Each of us must not accept bad behaviour,” K said, who was on the scene in the 70s when feminism was hitting its stride.
Nikki said the past six months have been a “big eye-opener”. She’d been brought up as a Catholic girl in the country and now, after 20 years of being off the scene, she’d come back and been shocked by the amount of aggro shown at pubs and niteclubs.
When she first joined the scene in 1990,there had been other issues to wrestle with. “Back then, everyone was labelled as a stone butch and you fucked.” [Nikki gave us a handout which defined a stone butch as: “a masculine female-bodied person who strongly dissociates from her body, to the point that she doesn’t allow her female parts to be touched or acknowledged. Emotionally, can be ‘untouchable’.”]
“It took 10 years for me to get through the stone butch shit. I’ve been labelled a ‘butch’, ‘stone butch’, a ‘top’.”
Nikki said roles should be about “choice. Communicate with your partner. Try to break it down – who kills the spiders? Who changes the lightbulb?
“Just because I’m butch, doesn’t mean I’m the one in control. I’m the caregiver at home, the strength. But I’m proud to be submissive as well. I missed out on lots and am making up for it now.”
Nikki urged butches to: “open doors, walk people to a taxi, take down the taxi number. Manners can be sexualised. It’s fun. Do little acts of chivalry.”
Participant Nicky added: “Courtesies don’t cost anything; they are priceless ways of showing respect and making others feel special and valued in what has become a self-centred culture.
“The feeling you get when you have manners – you feel great.”
Summary:
+Be graciousness.
+Be assertive, set boundaries.
+Pay it forward. Teach by example.
+When making your way through a crowded niteclub, touch someone on the back respectfully – don’t elbow people out of the way.
+Ageism – take it into consideration when interacting. Don’t be patronising.
