‘People are scared of the word “lesbian” – I want to find out why’
metro.co.ukJust Like Us, people across the UK have postponed coming out due to ‘harmful’ stereotypes, with 68% of lesbians delaying coming out due to stereotypes about being ‘man-hating’, ‘unattractive’ and even ‘anti-trans’.But why is it so hard for lesbians to come out as lesbians?
What exactly is wrong with the L word? Why was I so scared of it, and why nearly 10 years after I finally used the word to proudly describe myself, are so many people still scared to use it?Over the last few months, I’ve been an assistant producer on the Channel 4 documentary ‘Where Have All The Lesbians Gone?’ where we tried to answer these questions.
Unpacking the word lesbian, and why, even now, with lesbian representation at an all time high, some people still have such a fraught relationship with the word.Alongside lesbian photographer Vic Lentaigne, known for her intimate photographs of the queer community, we wanted to create a portrait of what lesbians and queer people looked like in 2022.Our research involved speaking to 12 women and non-binary people with a range of experiences, including lesbian comedians Rosie Jones and Jen Brister.
We explored their relationship to the word lesbian and their thoughts on the other words such as queer, gay and dyke. The final cut is on TV tonight and, in both equal parts funny and heart-wrenching, it reveals the results of our quest to find out how they identify and why, while looking into representation, visibility and homophobia.
