Butch: Difference between revisions

'''Butch''' is an [[LGBTQ|LGBTQ+]] [[masculine]] [[gender expression]] or [[gender identity]]. While many people who identify as butch use the term in reference to their gender expression, others claim it as a [[nonbinary]] identity in itself, notably [[Leslie Feinberg]], who defined butch as a gender neither male nor female. Butch is an identity that emerged in [[lesbian]] and bisexual culture in the 1940s, before there was a stark distinction in the community between types of women who were attracted to other women. Many lesbians have complicated relationships with gender, and may identify as simply butch. Butch is an identity that can be held by people of various queer sexual orientations and can belong to both cisgender and trans individuals. Traditionally, the identity and term butch has been used by individuals who are attracted to [[Femme|femmes]]. For some butches, this attraction to femmes represents a strong part of their own identity. Because of this, you will often see the dyadic term "[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Butch_and_femme butch/femme,"] or referrals to a butch/femme dynamic. However, some butches are attracted to other butches (this was already a topic in Leslie Feinberg's seminal novel [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stone_Butch_Blues Stone Butch Blues]). The phenomenon of butches attracted to other butches is commonly called "masc-for-masc".<ref name="Bashan" />

Depending on the community in question, butch people may call themselves by different terms. In LGBT communities of people of color, there may be a preference for the words '''aggressive''' ('''ag''' for short) or '''stud''', with much the same meaning as butch.<ref name="GreenPeterson">{{cite web|title=LGBTTSQI Terminology|date=2006|last1=Green|first1=Eli R.|last2=Peterson|first2=Eric N.|url=http://www.trans-academics.org/lgbttsqiterminology.pdf|work=Trans-Academics.org}}</ref> White people should use "butch" rather than "stud".<ref name="Bashan">{{Cite web |title=What Does It Mean To Be Butch? |author=Bashan, Frankie |work=Little Gay Book |date=2020 |access-date=29 September 2020 |url= https://www.littlegaybook.com/what-it-means-to-be-butch/}}</ref>

Masculinity is different than maleness. Butches are different than transgender men. Although transgender men were assigned female at birth (or sometimes intersex), and some identified as lesbian before recognizing that they were trans men, the difference is that butch lesbians generally identify as women, and feel attracted to women, whereas trans men identify as men, and may or may not feel attracted to women.