Lesbian erasure

Lesbian erasure is a form of lesbophobia that involves the tendency to ignore, remove, falsify, or reexplain evidence of lesbian women or relationships in history, academia, the news media, and other primary sources.^[1]^[2] Lesbian erasure also refers to instances wherein lesbian issues, activism, and identity is deemphasized or ignored within feminist groups,^[3] or the LGBTQ community.^[1]^[2]

In history

As with gay men, many historical lesbians or suspected lesbians are often straightwashed, particularly by past historians who considered lesbianism unseemly.

For years, historians overlooked the role of Irish lesbian couples in the Irish revolution, including Kathleen Lynn and Madeleine ffrench-Mullen; Margaret Skinnider and Nora O'Keeffe;and Elizabeth O'Farrell and Julia Grenan.^[4]^[5]^[6]^[7]^[8] Writing of Irish suffragist Eva Gore-Booth and her lifelong partner Esther Roper, historian Gifford Lewis wrote, "You will be pleased to know that I could ﬁnd not a trace of perverted sexuality".^[9]

Accounts of the 1969 Stonewall riots have been said to paint a "false narrative of white gay men leading the charge" while diminishing the critical involvement by butch lesbians, people of color, drag queens, transgender people.^[10]^[11]^[12]^[13] According to eyewitness accounts, the riot was initially sparked by police brutalizing a butch lesbian, sometimes believed to be Stormé DeLarverie.^[14]^[15]^[16]

In 1974, Kathy Kozachenko became the first openly gay politician to win an election in the United States. This achievement is often incorrectly ascribed to Harvey Milk, the first gay man to do so in 1977.^[17]^[18]

In 1976, French lesbian feminist Monique Wittig left France for the US,^[19] spurred on by fierce resistance she faced from other feminists while trying to create lesbian groups within the Mouvement de libération des femmes.^[19] At the time, the word lesbian was deemed an "un-French" American import, and Wittig recalled other MLF members seeking to "paralyse and destroy lesbian groups."^[19]

In South Africa, both during and after Apartheid, Black South African lesbians continue to face erasure, discrimination, and violence from other South Africans who consider lesbianism "un-African".^[20]^[21]

In literature

Some contemporary historians believe that American poet Emily Dickinson had an intimate relationship with her sister-in-law, Susan Gilbert, leading some academics to assert that she was a lesbian.^[22] Dickinson experts Ellen Louise Hart and Martha Nell Smith wrote that Gilbert was a muse to Dickinson, stating that "Emily's correspondence to Susan unequivocally acknowledges that their emotional, spiritual, and physical communion is vital to her creative insight and sensibilities."^[23] However, the Emily Dickinson Museum is ambiguous when discussing Dickinson's sexuality.^[24]

In music

Author and women's history scholar Bonnie J. Morris wrote that many lesbian singers and musicians are erased from music and its history. As an example, she notes that her college students are unaware of the thriving lesbian music scene that existed several decades ago.^[25]

In television & media

United States

After the introduction of the Hays Code in the U.S. in 1930, most references to homosexuality in American films were censored. Censors removed lesbian scenes from films, and originally-lesbian works were adapted into heterosexual or nonsexual ones. Lesbian films from abroad were not permitted to be shown in the U.S. The Hays Code was relaxed beginning in the 1960s.^[26]^: 102

Lesbian characters in 1990's American television were often depicted as side characters with little to no definitive information on whether they were lesbians or not. If an episode portrayed two women kissing or some form of homoromantic interactions between female characters, there would be a parental advisory for that specific episode. This was seen with the series Roseanne, where some advertising companies requested that their commercials be excluded from the "Don't Ask, Don't Tell" episode. There was also the issue of Ellen DeGeneres coming out on her show Ellen through her character Morgan in "The Puppy Episode", which received considerable pushback and backlash because of heteronormative views and the heterocentric culture of television.^[27]

The "bury your gays" trope (also called "dead lesbian syndrome") describes the tendency for lesbian and bisexual women in television to disproportionately die or meet tragic fates. In the 2015–2016 TV season, Vox writers noted that 22 of 242 permanent character deaths were queer women, or about 10%.^[28]

Russia

In Russia, any content containing positive portrayals of lesbianism or promoting "nontraditional" sexual relationships is banned by the government. Books and movies were pulled from shelves, and people who break the law are subject to court cases and fines of up to 5 million rubles.^[29]

In scholarship

While the traditional academic canon has recognized the contributions of gay men, those of lesbians have not received the same scrutiny.^[30] Political theorist Anna Marie Smith stated that lesbianism has been erased from the "official discourse" in Britain because lesbians are viewed as "responsible homosexuals" in a dichotomy between that and "dangerous gayness". As a result, lesbian sexual practices were not criminalized in Britain in ways similar to the criminalization of gay male sexual activities. Smith also points to the exclusion of women from AIDS research at the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. Smith argues that these erasures result from sexism and suggests that these issues should be addressed directly by lesbian activism.^[31]

Within the LGBTQ community

Alternative identity labels

Some lesbian feminists reject the use of the umbrella term queer, which they perceive as rendering lesbians less visible within the broader LGBTQ community.^[32]^[33] In her book The Disappearing L, lesbian scholar Bonnie J. Morris despairs that dyke has been replaced by queer among younger LGBTQ activists, a term she says represents a "disidentification" from womanhood and lesbianism.^[34] Writers have called lesbian a dirtier word than queer or gay, pointing to negative stereotypes of lesbians as well as the term's association with lesbian porn aimed at heterosexual men.^[35]^[36] Other writers argue that decreasing use of the term "lesbian" is due to an increase in trans identification and desire for gender-neutral, inclusive terms.^[37]^[38] However, recent data suggests that lesbian identity, if anything, is increasing in prevalence, leading Claire Thurlow to suggest that these fears are hyperbole.^[39]

In relation to transgender men

Anti-trans feminist groups including the Women's Liberation Front cite stories of young women detransitioning to claim that young people's transition is a social contagion which "erases butch women".^[40]^[41]^[42] In 2017, Ruth Hunt, a butch lesbian and then-CEO of the LGBT charity Stonewall, wrote that transphobic groups present the advancement of trans rights as erasing the identities of younger butch lesbians, but argues that this claim is unsubstantiated.^[41] Writing for The Economist, trans author Charlie Kiss argued that the stereotype of trans men being "lesbians in denial" is "demeaning and wrong"; he said he "could not have tried harder or longer to be a "true lesbian" but that it never felt right.^[43]^[a] According to Claire Thurlow, these gender critical arguments are not supported by empirical data and the concern that butch lesbians will be lost to trans identity is hyperbolic.^[39]

In relation to transgender women

There is discord between those who do and do not believe that trans women can be lesbians without erasing what it means to be a lesbian.^[45]^[46]^[47] Gina Davidson of The Scotsman summed up the conflict by asking if lesbianism is attraction to "female bodies" or to "feminine identity".^[46] In an article for Overland, Melbourne historian Liz Crash said trans-exclusionary lesbian advocacy groups use claims of erasure as a "pseudo-progressive cover to anti-trans hate."^[48]

Disputes around the inclusion of lesbian-only groups in LGBT events have occurred in various countries.^[45]^[46]^[47] In 2019, UK anti-trans group Get the L Out clashed with several pride festivals, including Pride in London where they forced their way to the front of the parade with signs claiming "transactivism erases lesbians".^[49]^[50] Organizers apologized for the incident and condemned the group.^[51]^[52] Also in 2019 New Zealand group "Lesbian Rights Alliance Aotearoa" reported being banned from the Wellington Pride Festival for its views on transgender people.^[53]^[54]^[55] Canadian group "The Lesbians Collective" was asked not to march in the Vancouver Dyke March with signs honoring "lesbian heroes" known for their gender-critical views.^[56]

Notes

^ The idea that most or all transgender men are solely attracted to women is considered outdated and a stereotype. A 2023 USA-based study found that, while 28.3% of trans men identified as straight, a further 23.9% identified as bisexual/pansexual, 15.8% identified as gay, 15% identified as queer, and the remaining 17% identified as other sexualities.^[44]

References

^ ^a ^b Wilton T (2002). Lesbian Studies: Setting an Agenda. Routledge. pp. 60–65. ISBN 1134883447.
^ ^a ^b Morris, Bonnie J. (2016). The Disappearing L: Erasure of Lesbian Spaces and Culture (1st ed.). Albany, New York: State University of New York Press. pp. 1–203. ISBN 978-1438461779.
^ Eloit, Ilana (October 21, 2019). "American lesbians are not French women: heterosexual French feminism and the Americanisation of lesbianism in the 1970s". Feminist Theory. 20 (4): 381–404. doi:10.1177/1464700119871852. S2CID 210443044 – via SAGE Publishing.
^ Rogers, Rosemary (May 23, 2015). "Wild Irish Women: Elizabeth O'Farrell – A Fearless Woman". Irish America.
^ McGreevy, Ronan (June 21, 2018). "The gay patriots who helped found the Irish State". Irish Times.
^ McGrath, Louisa (November 25, 2015). "It's Time to Acknowledge the Lesbians Who Fought in the Easter Rising (with Podcast)". Dublin Inquirer. Archived from the original on November 2, 2018.
^ Kelleher, Patrick (April 9, 2023). "How a lesbian couple's contribution to Ireland's Easter Rising was scrubbed from history". PinkNews.
^ McGrattan, Ciara (March 22, 2016). "The hidden histories of queer women of the Easter Rising". Gay Community News.
^ "Time to end the 'straight-washing' of Eva Gore-Booth and Esther Roper". Morning Star. February 13, 2018. Archived from the original on August 30, 2020. Retrieved November 15, 2025.
^ Times, The Rainbow (June 20, 2019). "In A Stonewall State Of Mind: Stormé DeLarverie's Missing Recognition". The Rainbow Times | New England's Largest LGBTQ Newspaper | Boston. Retrieved November 17, 2025.
^ Mehta, Maitri (August 4, 2015). "The First Stonewall Trailer is Under Fire for "Whitewashing" the Historic Gay Rights Riots". Bustle. Archived from the original on August 8, 2015. Retrieved August 5, 2015.
^ EDITOR (June 4, 2025). "The often forgotten lesbian and bisexual origins of Pride". Retrieved November 17, 2025.
^ Siede, Caroline (August 4, 2015). "The trailer for Roland Emmerich's Stonewall both documents and rewrites history". AV Club. Archived from the original on August 6, 2015. Retrieved August 5, 2015.
^ Yardley, William (May 29, 2014) "Storme DeLarverie, Early Leader in the Gay Rights Movement, Dies at 93 Archived June 29, 2021, at the Wayback Machine" in The New York Times.
^ Carter, David (2014). Stonewall: The Riots that Sparked the Gay Revolution. St. Martin's Press. p. 301. OCLC 865096291.
^ Drinkwater, Erin M. (June 14, 2014). "Remembering Storme DeLarverie". GO. Archived from the original on February 28, 2021. Retrieved August 8, 2019.
^ Friess, Steve (December 11, 2015). "The First Openly Gay Person to Win an Election in America Was Not Harvey Milk". Bloomberg News. Retrieved April 3, 2020.
^ Compton, Julie (April 2, 2020). "Meet the lesbian who made political history years before Harvey Milk". NBC News. Retrieved April 3, 2020.
^ ^a ^b ^c Eloit, Ilana (October 21, 2019). "American lesbians are not French women: heterosexual French feminism and the Americanisation of lesbianism in the 1970s". Feminist Theory. 20 (4): 381–404. doi:10.1177/1464700119871852. S2CID 210443044 – via SAGE Publishing.
^ Carlse, Janine E. (July 2018). "Black lesbian identities in South Africa: confronting a history of denial". Journal of Gender and Religion in Africa. 24 (1) (published May 26, 2020). doi:10.14426/ajgr.v24i1.39. hdl:10019.1/108964. ISSN 2707-2991.
^ Msibi, Thabo (2011). "The Lies We Have Been Told: On (Homo) Sexuality in Africa". Africa Today. 58 (1). Indiana University Press: 55–77. doi:10.2979/africatoday.58.1.55. JSTOR 10.2979/africatoday.58.1.55. S2CID 144208448.
^ Comment, Kristin M. (2009). ""Wasn't She a Lesbian?" Teaching Homoerotic Themes in Dickinson and Whitman". English Journal. 98 (4): 61–66. doi:10.58680/ej20087027. ISSN 0013-8274. LCCN 65059635. OCLC 1325886.
^ Hart, Ellen Louise; Smith, Martha Nell, eds. (1998). Open Me Carefully: Emily Dickinson's Intimate Letters to Susan Huntington Dickinson (1st ed.). Middletown, Connecticut: Paris Press. ISBN 0963818376.
^ Bartram, Robin; Brown-Saracino, Japonica; Donovan, Holly (February 2021). "Uncertain Sexualities and the Unusual Woman: Depictions of Jane Addams and Emily Dickinson". Social Problems. 68 (1): 168–184. doi:10.1093/socpro/spz058. ISSN 0037-7791. OCLC 1667861.
^ Morris, Bonnie J. (2016). The Disappearing L: Erasure of Lesbian Spaces and Culture (1st ed.). Albany, New York: State University of New York Press. p. 24. ISBN 978-1438461779.
^ Russo, Vito (1987). The Celluloid Closet: Homosexuality in the Movies. Harper & Row. ISBN 0-06-096132-5.
^ Price, Delana Janine (2021). Through Their Eyes: An Analysis of Misrepresentation in Popular Lesbian Television Narratives (M.A. thesis). Marshall University. Retrieved October 23, 2023.
^ Framke, Caroline; Zarracina, Javier; Frostenson, Sarah (June 1, 2016). "All the TV character deaths of 2015-'16, in one chart". Vox. Retrieved December 1, 2017.
^ Rescheto, Juri (January 29, 2023). "Russia bans LGBTQ-friendly content under new law". Deutsche Welle.
^ Morris, Bonnie J. (2016). The Disappearing L: Erasure of Lesbian Spaces and Culture (1st ed.). Albany, New York: State University of New York Press. p. 3. ISBN 978-1438461779.
^ Plummer, Ken, ed. (1992). "Resisting the Erasure of Lesbian Sexuality: A challenge for queer activism, by Anna Marie Smith". Modern Homosexualities: Fragments of Lesbian and Gay Experiences. London: Routledge. pp. 200–215. ISBN 978-0415064200.
^ Tyler, Robin (June 5, 2018). "Don't call me 'queer'". Los Angeles Blade. Archived from the original on June 9, 2016. Retrieved October 1, 2019.
^ Megarry, Jessica; Tyler, Meagan (November 2018). "Queer Inclusion or Lesbian Exclusion". Academia.edu. Retrieved October 1, 2019.
^ Morris, Bonnie J. (December 22, 2016). "Dyke Culture and the Disappearing L". Slate. Retrieved September 30, 2019.
^ Lewis, Julia Diana (July 13, 2018). "'Lesbian' Isn't a Dirty Word and More Millennials Need to Use It". The Advocate. Retrieved January 7, 2020.
^ Stephenson, Miranda (June 20, 2020). "Why is 'lesbian' still a dirty word?". varsity.co.uk. Varsity.
^ Keating, Shannon (February 11, 2017). "Can Lesbian Identity Survive The Gender Revolution?". BuzzFeed. Retrieved December 19, 2019.
^ Cauterucci, Christina (December 20, 2016). "For Many Young Queer Women, Lesbian Offers a Fraught Inheritance". Slate. Retrieved January 7, 2020.
^ ^a ^b Thurlow, Claire (January 2, 2024). "Sisters, it's been a while! The emotional pull of the lesbian 'gender critical' movement and a failure of solidarity". Journal of Lesbian Studies. 28 (1): 161–174. doi:10.1080/10894160.2023.2229144. ISSN 1089-4160. PMID 37394813.
^ Herzog, Katie (June 28, 2017). "The Detransitioners: They Were Transgender, Until They Weren't". The Stranger. Retrieved December 19, 2019.
^ ^a ^b Hunt, Ruth (November 16, 2017). "When transphobic people try to pretend they're defending butch lesbians like me, I see the cynical tactic for what it is". The Independent. Archived from the original on October 13, 2020. Retrieved December 19, 2019.
^ "Trans Starbucks and the Butch Genocide". Women's Liberation Front. Retrieved November 15, 2025.
^ Kiss, Charlie (July 3, 2018). "The idea that trans men are "lesbians in denial" is demeaning and wrong". The Economist. Retrieved December 19, 2019.
^ Reisner, Sari L.; Choi, Soon Kyu; Herman, Jody L.; Bockting, Walter; Krueger, Evan A.; Meyer, Ilan H. (September 15, 2023). "Sexual orientation in transgender adults in the United States". BMC Public Health. 23 (1): 1799. doi:10.1186/s12889-023-16654-z. ISSN 1471-2458. PMC 10503109. PMID 37715161.
^ ^a ^b Greenhalgh, Hugo (March 15, 2019). "Trans debate rages around the world, pitting LGBT+ community against itself". Reuters. Archived from the original on March 16, 2019. Retrieved June 19, 2019.
^ ^a ^b ^c Davidson, Gina (July 14, 2019). "Insight: How splits are emerging in LGBT movement over gender issues". The Scotsman. Archived from the original on July 16, 2019. Retrieved July 17, 2019.
^ ^a ^b Compton, Julie (January 14, 2019). "'Pro-lesbian' or 'trans-exclusionary'? Old animosities boil into public view". NBCNews.com. Archived from the original on June 19, 2019. Retrieved June 19, 2019.
^ Crash, Liz (September 4, 2023). "The truth about 'lesbian erasure'". Overland literary journal. Retrieved November 17, 2025.
^ Compton, Julie (January 14, 2019). "'Pro-lesbian' or 'trans-exclusionary'? Old animosities boil into public view". NBCNews.com. Archived from the original on June 19, 2019. Retrieved June 19, 2019.
^ Davidson, Gina (July 14, 2019). "Insight: How splits are emerging in LGBT movement over gender issues". The Scotsman. Archived from the original on July 16, 2019. Retrieved July 17, 2019.
^ Greenfield, Patrick (July 8, 2018). "Pride organisers say sorry after anti-trans group leads march". The Guardian. Archived from the original on June 9, 2019. Retrieved June 20, 2019.
^ "Pride in London sorry after anti-trans protest". BBC News. July 8, 2018. Archived from the original on June 30, 2019. Retrieved June 20, 2019.
^ Author (September 6, 2018). "Stand up for equality: no anti-trans hate groups in NZ". Gender Minorities Aotearoa | Transgender New Zealand. Retrieved November 15, 2025. {{cite web}}: |last= has generic name (help)
^ "They do not speak for us | Scoop News". www.scoop.co.nz. Retrieved November 15, 2025.
^ Greenhalgh, Hugo (March 15, 2019). "Trans debate rages around the world, pitting LGBT+ community against itself". Reuters. Archived from the original on March 16, 2019. Retrieved June 19, 2019.
^ Cormier, Danielle (August 13, 2018). "Lesbians are being excluded from the Vancouver Dyke March in the name of 'inclusivity'". Feminist Current. Archived from the original on October 17, 2018. Retrieved October 21, 2019.