lesbluean:

lesbluean:

directly or indirectly enforcing the idea that femmeness is this prescriptive set of aesthetics and not a fluid dynamic approach to encompassing a form of femininity which you ultimately decide for yourself/other women is definitely a huge part of what leads to so much confusion later on down the line once (especially younger) wlw finally break away from “sources” like huffpost and autostraddle and actually like…….idk talk to real femmes in their lives 

this is why so many femme blogs that posit themselves as “femme advice blogs” in even the vaguest sense of the word constantly receive questions such as “i don’t like wearing makeup or shaving my legs all the time, can i still be femme?” and “i’m fat so i don’t feel super comfortable in dresses, can i still be femme?” and that’s just……heartbreaking tbh.

the ONLY requirement to be a femme is to perform femininity in a way that’s exclusively for other women, thus subverting conventional straight women’s femininity no matter what you’re doing. presentation-wise, this can mean such a wide range of things that it’s never limited to just one look or aesthetic—not to mention that femmeness is never restricted to aesthetic alone.

this is also why so many femme lesbians, such as myself, examine our femmeness through the lens of gender to the point that often we find ourselves thinking things like “my gender IS femme” and whatnot. it’s such an all-encompassing part of our relationships with gender, attraction, presentation, self-identity, experiences, and (specifically wlw) community. so the fact that so many wlw are going into their exploration believing femmeness to be restricted by the same arbitrary beauty standards we’re subverting in the first place is just horrible. and i seriously wish the people who wrote their obnoxious thinkpieces on how they’re a queer femme cuz they wear stiletto heels and “eyeliner sharp enough to kill a man” knew just how much damage they were doing to the MAJORITY (yes, these thinkpiece writers are actually the minority) of the community who can’t/don’t want to meet the same rich white thin able-bodied women’s femininity that femmeness never has been and never will be centered around.