Butch Bullshit

Let’s talk about my frustration with traditionally butch women. Don’t get me wrong, I *love* butch women. I’m complaining about the ones who want to create a 1950s, heteronormative relationship with me because I happen to have long hair. Since I generally date women who are more masculine than myself, I run into a TON of this butch bullshit on the dating scene.

Story time! Many months ago, I went on a date with a woman who identifies as butch. When I say butch, I’m talking—coaches a ton of stereotypical lesbian sports, has a crew cut, and shortened her name to a monosyllabic sound—butch.

First, she bought me flowers… I know, this seems super nice and it totally is, but this was our first meeting. I get very nervous about the slightest whiff of heteronormativity when I date butch women. So, the flowers made me uneasy and hyper-aware of my relative femininity. She presented the flowers and I awkwardly muttered, “Oh. Uh. Wow. You bought me flowers? Uh, thanks.”

After the flowers, I decided to squash any heteronormative presumptions and establish my own butchness by demanding to buy her coffee. I know, you’re confused because of the name of this blog. Yes, I’m feminine-looking and I identify as femme, but I like to think I have a sprinkle of butch charm.

Since she bought me flowers, it seemed like an even exchange for me to buy the coffee, right? I marched up to the barista and said, “I’ll have a decaf americano, and whatever she’s having.” While she gave her order, I pulled out my credit card. I turned to her and said, “Please let me get this as a thank you for your gift.” She laughed like I was being totally absurd and said, “Oh no. I’m buying your coffee.” I assertively said, “No, really. It’s on me.” I handed my card to the barista, but she pushed my hand down and replaced it with her card. I awkwardly said, “No, really. Please let me pay,” as I pushed my card over hers. Then this happened:

Eventually, monosyllabic butch gave my arm a *big* shove, lowered her voice, and demanded, “Take it,” to the barista. I really wanted to continue the battle, but 1) I was surprised/annoyed by how hard she pushed me, 2) I knew I would not win an arm battle with this softball coach, and 3) the barista could NOT have looked less amused with these shenanigans.

As we walked over to retrieve our drinks, I begrudgingly thanked her for the coffee. She responded, “It’s cute that you thought I was going to let you buy your coffee.”

Baaaaaaaarrrrrrfffff!

I fantasized about saying, “It’s cute that you think I would put up with this demeaning bullshit after *finally* escaping misogynistic men.” Then I would turn to the barista, tell her to make my coffee to go, and make a dramatic exit. But I’m a wimp, so I took my cup of coffee to the table where my flowers awaited to endure the rest of the date. 

During our conversation, I made sure to say, “I may look femme, but I have a very butch personality.” She laughed and said, “You’re pretty feminine, though.” In little-kid-tantrum-style, I defended, “I’m really not that feminine, plus I don’t do roles.” Hmph! *stomps my foot*

This heteronormative, femme-demeaning behavior really pisses me off. Just because I’m (frequently) more feminine than the women I date, does not mean I’m a lesser human being! Some butch women are so invested in roles that they treat femme-presenting women worse than straight men do. If I wanted an unequal relationship with a partner who doesn’t respect me, I would have settled down with one of the 703,829 men I dated who treated me like shit.

This heteronormative crap is especially frustrating when you’re as captivated by butch women as I am. I’m really into butch women, like really into butch women, but when I go on dates with women who are masculine, I feel like I’m just waiting for them to treat me like a fragile, stupid, incompetent person who doesn’t have a mind of her own. I expected this shit from men when I was “straight,” but from women? Come on.

Any non-douchey masculine-of-center women out there? Oh, there are only six of you total? What’s that? You’re all coupled or married already? Cool, cool. Pet adoption, here I come.