“I once rejected a trans woman because they are male and he tried to rape me to teach me to like penis.”

I'm a lesbian, and I feel nervous about trying to date. I don't want to have to change with men, either. (I'm in high school, and we have changing rooms without stalls. I don't mind dressing in front of other women, but I'm scared that I'll have to be naked in front of a guy.)

I was drawn into [gender ideology] for a few years and badly damaged my breasts from 'chest binding' before finally realising that I didn't have to transition to be myself. I am a lesbian and I can dress how I like. Unfortunately, my girlfriend has now started to believe that she has to become a man, take hormones and have surgery, and I'd be called transphobic if I said anything against this. My best male friend has decided he's a lesbian and now I'm transphobic for not wanting to date him.

All of the friends I met through a gay support group now identify as transgender. I am now the only person who is openly gay (and isn't transgender) in that group. Most of them are born women and identify as pansexual non binary people.

I am a lesbian. I am an adult human female. I am a woman. I have a womb and ovaries and I bleed once a month. I will never have sex with a man. I will never devote my time to men. I will never apologise for loving putting women first. Gender ideology is an astroturfed movement riding on the coattails of same sex attracted people and everything they have done for our liberation.

Woman is not an identity, it is not a feeling or an idea in a man’s head. I am losing the language that accurately describes my experience as a woman. I am now a bleeder, a menstruator, a person with a vagina. My body has been broken down into bits to be consumed by men. I cannot say I am exclusively same sex attracted because that is now bigoted. I cannot protest against men walking into toilets and changing rooms and prisons where they do not belong because that is also bigoted. I cannot refuse to date a man that thinks he is a woman because that is bigoted.

If I speak up I am threatened with rape, with murder, with graphic, sexually explicit violence these men wish to inflict on me for the crime of being a woman and a lesbian. One of the most well known women was harassed for months with these threats and nothing was done. I will not be part of this movement that sterilises children and creates life long medical patients of scared, gender non conforming and often homosexual people. I will never apologise for who I am and what I know is fact, no matter who it offends.

No easily accessible Lesbian communities left, we have to go to WBW Fests on Land, no womens bookstores, so many Butch Sisters being convinced to transition which breaks my heart and puts greater pressure on those of us remaining that we "must be men" too.

No Lesbian only spaces and fewer and fewer women only ones, how are we supposed to socialize, flirt, make friends or date AS LESBIANS when our very name is anathema to the "queer crowd"? Where Prides are no longer safe for us and Lesbians near invisible because everybody is "queer "?

We are caught between two lobster claw pinchers the het straight world which doesn't "get" us and often discriminates against us and the more and more unsafe gbt alphabet soup one which is hostile to us and no longer represents us, threatening us with violence and censorship should we speak out!!!

- FeistyAmazon

The word I use to describe myself has been taken from me, I am no longer a woman I am a “bleeder” “uterus haver” “non man” “non prostate haver” and it makes me feel dehumanised. I can no longer talk about issues that women like me have, because it’s not inclusive enough... “NOT ALL WOMEN HAVE VAGINAS! NOT ALL WOMEN HAVE UTERUSES! NOT ALL WOMEN CAN GET PREGNANT! MEN CAN GET PREGNANT TOO!” I can no longer express the issues female humans have to deal with and how difficult it was to grow up with oppressive gender roles.

I can no longer call myself a lesbian because lesbians now have to be attracted to males too... I once rejected a trans woman because they are male and he tried to rape me to teach me to like penis. I managed to escape but whenever I bring the attempted assault up I get silenced and told that I shouldn’t talk about it as it puts trans women in a bad light. Some even say I deserved it and that I should un learn my “preference” for vaginas and women to include males who identifies as women.

I’m sick and tired of having my biological oppressive reality appropriated. I was born a woman and I was born same sex attracted but now I get death and rape threats because of it and people are stealing the words I and other lesbians have been using for ourselves.

It’s exhausting and I feel like I’m walking on egg shells too afraid of speaking as I could get accused of “wrong think” and being bigoted. I can’t even talk about women’s oppression in my home country Iran anymore, whenever I do that online trans activists always shame me for not talking about how trans women are treated there too...