Butch/Femme Dynamic vs "Masculinity" and "Femininity"

[Cin]

Originally Posted by EnderD_503

That's not the way I see it. When I see people talk about how femmes queer femininity/butches queer masculinity, I still see an underlying comparison or presupposition of an "original"...that there is some kind of original masculine/feminine form to be queered to begin with. If there wasn't, then we wouldn't be queering it. The very fact that it is queered means that there is a form that is unqueered, and that fact that one is queered and the other unqueered suggests original vs. queered.

But you said -

I also fully understand where this becomes problematic for myself (and perhaps for some others). As I mentioned before, what then defines my attraction to femmes if not femininity, and a femme's attraction to butches if not masculinity? I guess I'm coming to closer to feeling like the answer to that, for me, is how each one actually defies the socially accepted categories. Perhaps (speaking for myself only of course) it's that complete denial of socially accepted masculinity/femininity coupled with individual physical characteristics (that neither define butch or femme) one just happens to find attractive. All that can just be "femme" or "butch," no?

So I said:
Originally Posted by Miss Tick
Is that not the same as masculinity queered and femininity queered? Is that not what people mean when they speak of how hot they think masculinity in a female body is? Or how femmes queer femininity and find it so much more comfortable when it is in a queer context rather than in a heterosexual one?

So what you mean is that defying the socially accepted categories of masculinity and femininity does not mean queering them but instead it means denying the existence of masculine and feminine at all in any content or context in queer identity or vocabulary? Have I got it yet?

Hmm...I don't think so. Even on this forum we've seen members pop up who talk about how they've felt that butch fits them, but that they have these characteristics and these characteristics that doesn't make them feel traditionally butch. I think it was controlled, but I think the community is making some effort to undo that. At least on an individual to individual basis (versus talking about generalizations).

I do see effort but I don't see this becoming a wide spread belief. There still is quite a hierarchy. But I might be limited in my scope.