THE

FEMININE

VIEWPOINT

by Jane Race

What is a lesbian? According to a recent correspondent in The Ladder, "A true lesbian is a male entity." That the writer explains and supports this statement with a few superficial arguments drawn from the theory of reincarnation is extraneous. What is relevant is that this view (there is no need to discuss its male counterpart here) is widely held among homophiles and heterosexuals. It is high time that this belief, which places the non-masculine part of the female homophile world in some nameless limbo, be examined.

If The Ladder's correspondent and her many co-believers are convinced of the truth of this statement, then the women who accept and return their love differ in no way from other women. Rather-I exclude here those who through ignorance are led to believe that their lover or husband is a man for reasons unstated and presumably unknown they have chosen to ally themselves with creatures who are but sorry imitations of that crown of creation, man. If this is the case, if knowing and having available true men, these women willfully prefer men in women's bodies (whatever the explanation of this sad plight), then here is true perversion, and The Ladder's correspondent should eschew all commerce with such baggage.

18

Self-vaunting, at the expense of the love object, is a product of the late 19th century. Up to that time, the lesbian found her sex far more of an asset than a handicap. It gave her a freedom of association with women which no man could hope to have. In both European and Oriental societies, the separation of the sexes, both in duties and pastimes, created a situation where lesbianism could and did exist as a matter of course. Although one of the two women thus involved often influenced or even dominated the other, she usually did so not by imitating a man but by presenting something of a contrast to the too often convenience chosen husband.

While literature, history and even folksong afford many examples of women dressing and living as men, and even going into battle, yet in most cases the motives had nothing to do with lesbianism. Though Xerxes might declare of Artemisia after the battle of Salamis (480 B.C.) that the men fought like women and the women like men, Artemisia's motives for her naval exploits lay in political necessity, not in any confusion of mind and body.

Mu Lan cut her cloudlike hair, bought horse and armor, and marched away to the northern frontiers of