so in the world of intergenerational LGBTQ twitter wars today, apparently Gen Z former tumblr teens are angry that a non-lesbian said the name of a podcast created & hosted by lesbians in the course of promoting said podcast, because its name includes the word “dyke”.

I’m not sure how someone is supposed to promote LGBTQ creators’ art or writing or whatever if only people from identical segments of the community are allowed to say the title of the work; but

are we supposed to just obliquely refer to ‘Dykes to Watch Out For’ as “Alison Bechdel’s long-running pre-Fun Home lesbian comic strip”?

Which Pansy Division songs are lesbians allowed to talk about or sing along to?

This all has the same energy as “bisexual men can’t say fag” discourse and it’s so tiresome.

It’s tied up in this expectation that it’s somehow possible to box LGBTQ identities in discrete & hyperspecific ways & calculate exactly how these identities rank vs. one another & determine who is allowed to say and do what & thus have precise predictable notions of harm

and like....LGBTQ identities aren’t that stable and separate! or at least they weren’t. maybe they are now, or will be, but identity and community are messy and complicated! doubly so when it comes to what we call ourselves vs. what str8 people called us & when & in what contexts

and we’ve reclaimed some words, and sometimes words can be said within the community with affection and sometimes words can be said within the community in ways that are still harmful or cruel and there’s no one-size-fits-all answer that lets you ignore context & just have a Rule

if you really think that gay & bisexual men and non-lesbian trans people should refer to the motorcycle riding group leading the Pride Parade as “D-slurs on Bikes” or that a lesbian professor of queer literature should talk about Larry Kramer’s “F-slurs” ...

If you don’t want to personally reclaim words, great! If you don’t want to be referred to in certain ways, by all means! But LGBTQ culture is full of art & groups & venues & events that playfully or affectionately use ID terms that have also been used pejoratively by str8 people.

You can’t declare every LGBTQ person who talks about or engages with parts of LGBTQ culture that use words that don’t strictly refer to their specifically delineated identity a homophobe. I mean, I guess you can, but it’s silly.