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Butch Is Beautiful (Too).

Leon Stevens

It has become standard practice in some Gay philosophical circles to brand "butch" clothing and demeanor as oppressive because it appears in the pre-sixties male caste system. This "liberated" view indicts the "macho" look and espouses "camp" as the true reflection of the new and real universal male. This orientation is unfair and misleading.

The expression of male superiority in apparel and physique reached its overt and perhaps apocalyptic climax in the nineteenth and twentieth century. During this period, drab-colored sturdy garb was assigned to men, while bright delicate clothing was allotted to women. Men generally brandished tweeds, heavy cotton or linen, denim and leather, leaving women to parade in chiffon, gauze, gingham, satin, etc. Men cultivated rugged, muscular physiques, and women nurtured soft. petite figures. It might appear that these role manifestations are extremes deviating from an abstract unisexual center. Not so! The deliberate weakening of the female is peculiar only to Homo Sapiens. In most species the female is equal or superior in physical stature to the male. In some mammalian species, the initial dependence of infants upon the female and the greater expendability of the male have permitted or induced hereditary male dominance. Yet even here it is hardly the rule. (For instance, the female grizzly bear brutally evicts the male from the den after she gives birth.) In any case, male dominance is not intrinsic to our species as the existence of several human matriarchal societies proves. Furthermore, the biand tri-ceps of any Moscow woman bricklayer or olympic female shot-putter attest to the fact that women are just as capable of developing powerful musculatures as men. In recent history man has atrophied the feminine form and molded it into a rather unnatural fetish. Health and vigor are necessary for the survival of all species, but since human beings have acquired an extreordinary ability to modify and transform their environment, they have been able to afford the biological luxury of physically handicapping half of their species. Weakness, vulnerability, fluidity, and penetrability should not be considered innately feminine. What we know to be "effeminate" is not necessarily a virtue, anymore than chaining oneself means that he is freeing slaves. In past centuries it was customary in China to permanently bandage the feet of young girls causing them to become lame adults. Certainly we should not expect liberated Chinese men to do the same to demonstrate that they are not "macho." Feminine weakness should be replaced by strength just as male agression should be replaced by mutual accomodation. The opposite of "passive" is not, after all, "aggressive" but "active." Strength makes a far more constructive fetish than weakness.

Finally, I enjoy denim, leather, non-competitive athletics and various "butch" hardware and activities. I feel I should not be condemned as a backward, domineering barbarian on the basis of my masculine, physical, and spiritual paraphernalia.