The Village Voice declares butch is back — with a twist

The new blue glasses are possible the cutest thing on this web site... no lie. I really like this article, especially:

"The Village Voice suggests butch identity has evolved from its origins as a means of survival to a feminist political statement to today’s more personality-based accessory that is less about labels and more about looking good"

Thats a great insight to how our views are changing. Butch used to be baggy ripped jeans and plaid, and the length of your head hair matching the length of your armpit hair. Now women like Ellen are still seen as butch but walk around looking classy in Armani or Gucci. The entire esthetic of the butch female is changing and damn i like it!!

To every feminist action, there is an equal and opposite reaction- Naomi Wolf

Miss Rachel Maddow,

 I guess I am not the only one Polish Girl totally in love with You!!

"Though seemingly, besides mani-pedis, make-up and better-fitting suits, what really sets today’s butch apart is that they are also desirable to men.

Wow, talk about your unintended consequences." lol

Butch is sexy, always has been. So is intelligence.

 Butch, Femme, Feminist, Label or Ladle all I know is they're HOT and boy can they pull off wearing glasses and ties...YUMMY!

"This is my letter to the world who never wrote me"

E. Dickinson

That was actually not a bad article. I am pleasantly surprised! It's nice to read a mainstream article about butches that doesn't denigrate them for once. Thanks for pointing it out!

www.malindalo.com

I actually can't stop laughing at the second last photo.

... Rachel wins

It confuses me when people say things like "new sexy butch." As I look at my friends I see many women who have been dressing, and wearing the same hairstyles as the women you listed above for YEARS. Rachel Maddow doesn't have a new sexy butch look. You're just finally seeing more women like her in the media...but we have been here in our community all along.

Thanks to the Village Voice for recognizing that there's something inherently hot about powerful, intelligent women who can spit confidently in the face of traditional femininity and still be sexy as hell. Let me rock a power suit, tie, made-up face and heels any day of the week...

She is the PERFECT balance of masculine, feminine, and geek.  Love her! 

<3 K

The article seems to take different butch lesbians with obvious different styles and present them as one image or even one person.

I mean, yay! Props to Maddow...but I don't think she's getting pedicures, ya know? These are different women with a different take on butch.

I think most of us dress differently for work. I don't know who would want to be known for what they wear to work. I essentially dress as casually as I can get away with. So, "fashion conscious" for some may just as well be "I know I have to look somewhat presentable and professional." ha!

What's rather ironic is that the article seems to trash the very generation that some of these women hail from. So...the new butch is being defined by the same women that defined the 90s butch. I'm a little younger, but I did do the flannel and boots in the 90s in my late teens/early 20s. Why I don't now is because I'm 32.

When you're 20 you want to look like you're 20 (or maybe 21), not like you're 12. Because that's what you do when you're younger...try not to look younger. LOL And if you're butch that means finding a way to be butch without looking like a 12 year old... boy. I mean, the boy thing is fine...12 year old, not so much.

When you're 30 you can wear whatever and be confident no one is going to mistake you for a 12 year old. Although I was recently carded for buying...things you have to be 18 to buy...which surprised me LOL

So, I think that's the difference. Younger butches are finding a way to look butch without looking 12...and I guess that means getting manicures or whatever. Older butches have just grown comfortable with not necessarily looking their age. I mean, for real...Ellen is 51...does she dress like a 51 year old?

The big WTF part though was

huh? The vibe I get from Maddow is she's reserved about her sexuality. Repeat after me: being gay and out doesn't mean flaunting sexuality. She can't even read romantic emails aloud. Sexual innuendo causes "hives of embarrassment."

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Tweet: @GrrrlRomeo

I love the second pic from the top.  Her glasses are awesome, I don't think most people could pull them off like her.  I wish she could wear glasses (and her own clothes) on the show.

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"Great.  Not only do I feel creepy but now I look like I'm 1,000 and that I've been smoking meth all my life." -Sara Quin

"The Village Voice suggests butch identity has evolved from its origins as a means of survival to a feminist political statement to today’s more personality-based accessory that is less about labels and more about looking good."

That's just a funny line!  Butch identity as personality-based accessory..LOL!

Love the glasses, prefer the blue!

Honestly what I think most people find sexy about her has absolutely nothing to do with looks or fashion (except maybe the glasses which add charming, goofy, nerd status).  I think what makes her sexy to most people, male or female, is how fucking articulate she is, and how she can remain completely cool and say exactly what she wants to in any circumstance.  So many of us only figure out after the crucial moment of debate or interaction exactly how we could have said something or come back from a comment we new to be manipulative, twisted, or misleading... She manages to get right to it, and with such eloquence, sensativity, and intentionality that you feel like cheering, and that's seductive. 

shhh...I looked the same in 1995

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Tweet: @GrrrlRomeo

I think she has too much make up on in that last picture.

It took a while, but at least straight people are catching on to the whole " not all butch girls have mullets" thing.

http://myyounggaylife.blogspot.com/

The best thing about Rachel?  She is nothing but herself.  She's kind and respectful and intelligent and yes, butch and beautiful.  I want to thank her personally for being out and being out there for all of us.  She makes me smile everytime I watch her show. 

She is at her sexiest during her shows in my personal opinion. When she's in her hot power suits and her hair & make up is at it's best... she's amazing.

 But she is as butchy as I think I cuold ever go. The only other butch types I've fallen for is the one who isn't actually gay. Mariska Hargitay aka Olivia Benson. Butchy McFabulous. She was that final straw where I was like, uh, yea, I'm gay.

As far as Maddow, she's like the max butch I think I cuold ever like. I like her glossed up version... The femmier the better. But I KNOW she's just one of those butches where if I saw hher on the street.. make up or no make up.. power suit or flannel.. I could not get enough.

Her brains, convictions and sarcasm is just tooo much to handle!!!!

"There would be no black and white, the world would just treat my wife right. We could walk down in Mississippi, and no one would look at us twice. That's my dreamworld." - Dreamworld by Robin Thicke

this article in the village voice was LONG overdue!!

XO

AJ 

did i mention i want maddow's glasses? i do.

@askajanything 

I think this oversimplifies the ways in which "butchness" can be expressed. I think there have been some media efforts to push the label towards some of the less flattering stereotypes of what the look is about. And I've always felt it's more of an attitude that the media image follows. There's lots of ways this can reflect in the way women carry themselves and dress.

The nicest thing about the article is what it does to embrace the label, because, despite attempts to sideline it, it's an important one, it's connected with the full plurality of female expression that's suppressed in mainstream society (don't make me say patriarchy). We recognise it because it a challenge to the norms and I am all for it evolving into a less reactionary statement, but hell I love butch girls (and all you other types too!). 

Butch girls make me weak at the knees

She gets off on all different sorts of people sexually, but she falls for butches.~~Tristan Taormino

but I LOVE her glasses. hugely. If I had a pair like that I'd sleep with them on.

Anyway, butch has never gone anywhere. It's always been here, people just don't know where or how to look. But now that peoples' eyes have been opened, come out, all ye butches! Give us more eyecandy to look at; Queer Eye Candy lasts us only so long.

I love that Rachel Maddow comes out of nowhere and gets famous and now it's like the straight community is really who's infactuated with her (of course the gay community is but we surely don't account for those ratings!) and has been trying to figure her out since, trying to figure out her appeal. ON the Rachel Maddow show, she doesn't even look that "butch" to me, however this is what everyone saw first, and knowing she's gay-called her "butch". Now when she's just making other appearances and being herself she looks butch i mean she is butch I just think it's funny but COOL that we are getting visibility through Rachel in this way that was totally accidental after all this time fighting to be seen...this sorta came out of nowhere 

Um...I know that statement is covering a couple different topics i'm EXTREMELY sleepy but this post caught my attention.

http://twitter.com/janays 

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"I know how I was born and I know that I have no choice. I know it may not show on the color of my skin, but I know it’s in my heart and in my soul."-Sara Quin

The blue specs, black specs, make up, flannel shirts. No matter what she looks like she is the ultimate geek chic.

My Maddow crush must be at its height, has been for ages, my crushes don't usually last this long! LOVE her glasses, most couldn't pull them off, they'd look horrid on me. I love the photo of her on cocktail day but without the zip-up hoody, talking to Jimmy Fallon in a black T-shirt = hot!!!

Hmm I would like to see her in a tie but the bracers were cooler maybe. Saw that old photo of her, hmm not so keen on her that butch, but like her boyish (cuddly looking and cute) and power-y = hot :) saw

anyone seen the pics of her in school with blonde hair in a ponytail with a fringe (bangs) and lipgloss? messes with your mind, lol

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My AfterEllen/Bridget Video Game

"there's always time for a burrow..."

"We're getting fired, fired, fired, fi..

It's good to finally read about something similar to me.  Im the butch type...but not the flannel and baggy kind.

Thank you so much!

It wasn't just old school butch lesbians who had mullets (back in the day) ... Everyone I know had a variation of the mullet - gay or straight.

I have trouble with straight media thinking it's ok to even declare that butches "are back" or are "in" ... humans should not be reduced to a TREND.

It reminds me of the dreaded 90's 'cool to be a lesbian' phase ... pretty soon straight society was over it and Ellen couldn't get a job.