I don't get it? Being Gay only refers to dudes?

[trumad]

:shrug:

[Moonbeam_Starlight]

1. I HAVE heard some homosexual women refer to themselves as gay

but for the most part, gay is thought of as referring to homosexual men and lesbian as referring to homosexual women.

[trumad]

4. Was there a memo on this...

[gospelized]

2. personally

i couldn't care less. gay or lesbian is fine with me. what i'm called isn't an issue.

[Lindsey]

3. I'm a lesbian and often refer to myself as gay.

..but they still call this "community" (in order to be inclusive):lesbian,gay, bisexual, and transgender. Much more commonly referred to as LGBT.

[radfringe]

5. ditto

call me what you want, just don't call me late for dinner

[Mara Steele]

6. lesbian is a funny word!

gay is easier to say!

[arwalden]

9. Don't Be Silly... I Just ADORE The Word "Lesbian"

I love the way it sounds. I love each syllable. I love it when the "s" is pronounced as a soft-s sound and when it's pronounced as a hard-z sound.

Lesbian.

Lesbian.

Say it with me... les-bi-an!

-- Allen

[Moonbeam_Starlight]

11. I prefer the Spanish version

lesbiana....so pretty. Sounds like a girl's name. Lesbiana.

[gospelized]

7. the term lesbian

has been used for hundreds and hundreds of years to describe homosexual women. the term gay wasn't used until the '50s to describe homosexual men. before that homosexual men in western culture were only called homosexual, because they were only considered homosexual and nothing else. they started describing themselves as gay because they wanted an adjective that wasn't trying to define their entire person as just a homosexual.

the term lesbian looooooooooong predates that. the word has roots back to 1st century Greece.

so maybe that's why some are offended by being called gay. lesbianism is a seperate idea with it's own identity.

but myself, i don't care either way. i actually kinda like the word Sapphic.

[trumad]

8. Thanks....

I learn somthing new every day....

[soothsayer]

10. Gay is a catch all---kinda like "cattle"

when cattle are actually made up of bulls and cows and steers

Or chickens, which are roosters and hens

Gays are lesbians and, uh....gay men!

on edit, i'm a lesbian who uses gay and lesbian interchangeably when referring to myself. I'm not in love with queer the way today's young gays are, but i'm not offended by it either. I think it's funny to have so many identifiers!