Dyke

Dyke or dike is a slur commonly used to refer to lesbians, especially butch lesbians. It targets and has been reclaimed by all manners of AFAB, lesbian, feminine-aligned, and intersex queer people, such as transmasculines, m-spec lesbians and sapphics, nonbinary people, and transgender & sapphic non-lesbians.

Alternate Names

 * Bulldyke (African American English, to be used only by Black dykes)
 * Morphodyke (intersexist slur, only to be reclaimed by intersex individuals)
 * Butch dyke (a masculine dyke, often considered to be its own gender identity and under the trans umbrella)

Etymology
The origin of the term dyke is unknown, however there are theories on where it originated:

Pronunciation

 * Shortening of morphodyke, an intersexist slur derived from hermaphrodite--this etymology is considered unlikely
 * "Diked out," or to be overdressed, especially of an effeminate man
 * From the term "bulldyke" as a short form

In turn, bulldyke has its own unique possible origins:


 * A long form of dyke
 * "Bull" (false) and "dyck" (penis), to mean "false penis"--a reference to lesbian sexual practices and possibly clitoromegaly
 * "Bull" (manly, aggressive) and "dyke" (diked out) to mean "an aggressive and overdressed person"

Ultimately, linguists have settled on the label "of obscure origin."



Definitions
Due to the term's complex history, the definition of dyke varies by source. However, the most widely agreed upon are:


 * a contemptuous term used to refer to a lesbian
 * a masculine lesbian or woman
 * any queer person who is a woman or perceived as incorrectly performing womanhood
 * those who are questioning and challenging gender constructs and the social definitions of women: transdyke, MTF, transfeminine, transmasculine, genderqueer, and gender fluid dykes



History & Reclamation
''Dyke is not just a sexual orientation. It’s a political identity. It stands for community. It stands for solidarity. It stands for radical fight. It stands for trans*, black, brown, queer, bisexual, lesbian, disabled, chronically ill, fat, femme, butch, indigenous, gender expansive love. It does not stand by erasure. By displacement. By appropriation. By hate.'' -- Dyke March

Dyke originated as a slur specifically targeting anyone perceived as a lesbian, often due to being a woman or AFAB and displaying lesbian traits. Nearly as soon as the term became a slur, it was reclaimed by lesbians and especially non-cis individuals. Many found the term to be far closer to their gender than any other words available, which hugely contributed to its rapid reclamation by transgender, genderqueer, and nonbinary dykes.

The reclamation of the term dyke first originated in working class lesbian circles, especially bars, and likely in lesbian prison culture.

Lesbians

 * "We unmade words and remade them in our own image, and when outsiders called us dykes, we wore the name proudly."

Most well-known is the lesbian history of reclaiming dyke. Notably, many lesbians who reclaimed dyke specifically did so out of rebellion and nonconformity, embracing the term as a response to violence. The start of the push to reclaim dyke specifically as a standalone identity is often attributed to the works of Judy Grahn, an author and butch lesbian dyke, and especially her first poetry collection "Edward the Dyke and Other Poems" published 1971. It is of note that this work is often considered to be just as much about transgender masculine people as it is about lesbians.

Later, and possibly more famous, is the work of Leslie Feinberg and especially the Stone Butch Blues published in 1993. Feinberg proudly self identified as a butch dyke, defining butch dykes as under the transgender umbrella. Feinberg hirself identified as a "transgender, lesbian, [and] female" as well as a drag king, and incorporated this into hir expansive definition of dyke. Hir work also contributed massively to lesbian and dyke culture, illustrating how blurred the lines between lesbians, dykes, and trans people were.

Black Dykes & Bulldykes
The first known instances of the term "bulldyke" to refer to lesbians both originate from works in the Harlem Renaissance published in 1926; "bulldiker" in N-gger Heaven by Carl Van Vechten, and "bulldycking" in Home to Harlem by Claude McKay. Both predate the first known instance of "dike" alone by five years, making it unlikely that bull- originated as simply a modifier to "dyke." In modern times, bulldyke is often considered to refer to a stud lesbian (a specifically Black lesbian form of masculinity), or is simply a reclaimed label by any Black dyke.

There is some debate as to whether bulldyke includes Latine dykes, due to the closely related histories of Black and Latine queers, though the general consensus is typically that non-Black Latines should still refrain from identifying as the term.

Boydykes & Guydykes
The term "boydyke" predates May 2001, with the first known online instance defining it as "a boyish looking, or boy-identified dyke"--though the website itself is retired and cannot be found. Boydyke has historically been defined in a few ways, with, of course, dykes who are also boys being the most common. A boydyke may be nonbinary, transmasculine, boyish, a demiboy, or someone with a feminine gender and some form of masculine alignment or expression. Many boydykes are lesbians, but not all are.

Guydyke was coined May 6 2001 by Clare, creator of GirlFags.com, to refer to men and masculine people who are queerly attracted to lesbian and bi women. A guydyke "may (or may not) also feel he is (fully or partly) a 'lesbian in a man's body.'" It was specifically coined due to awareness of the term boydyke to be distinct, though boydykes can be guydykes. Guydyke is often used by AMAB nonbinary and queer individuals, and some transgender women or cis men may identify with the term.

Controversy
Reclaiming the term has been the subject of many various controversies since its original reclamation. In modern times, most pushback comes from Trans Exclusionary Radical Feminists (TERFs) due to the radical inclusion of the label. There is also a large amount of discourse around who can reclaim the slur, especially from m-spec lesbian and lesboy exclusionists. For example, TERFs tend to argue that dyke is a term exclusive to cisgender monosexual lesbians, and that any use of it by other groups is appropriation. M-spec lesbian exclusionists will often claim that the term "dyke" is rooted in disinterest and unavailability to men. Finally, people who exclude non-female lesbians may argue that the term is explicitly and solely targeting women, and hence any non-woman claiming it is being lesbophobic and misogynistic.

All of these statements are untrue. The slur directly targets women and anyone perceived as woman-adjacent for masculine traits and for lesbianism, not necessarily lack of interest in men. What is considered a "masculine trait" ranges from having a penis, to not being a woman, to simply being queer. As seen above, there is also a long and rich history of the term "dyke" being reclaimed by a number of non-women, non-lesbians, transgender, and m-spec individuals.

Subsets

 * Dykegender
 * Boydyke
 * Guydyke
 * Fagdyke

Flags
A number of dyke flags have been coined over time

Labrys flag
The labrys lesbian flag, while not officially a dyke flag, has been commonly associated with the dyke identity and was coined in 1999. This has largely gone out of style for a number of reasons:


 * The creator, Sean Campbell, was a gay man and not a lesbian
 * The inverted black triangle is primarily a symbol of the Romani genocide during the Holocaust, and is inappropriate for non-Roma to reclaim
 * It was commonly used by exclusionists and TERFs, tainting the symbol for many

An alternative version of the flag with a black background and purple triangle is sometimes used to address the issues with the black triangle and coining.

ari-the-demigod's flag
A flag by a DeviantArt user with the username ari-the-demigod is the first known dyke flag. This flag has no known meaning and the original coining has been deleted.

plantbutch's flag
A second and more popular dyke flag was created by Tumblr user and dyke plantbutch on or before February 21 2020. The meaning of the flag is as follows:


 * Black field: power, strength, and freedom that comes with reclaiming dyke. also representative of any and all black wlw and black nonbinary sapphics who identify as dyke, as they have always been the backbone of this community.
 * Purple: the bittersweet history of ‘dyke’ as a violent slur used against us becoming a positive identifier in our lives.
 * Magenta: a never-wavering love for women (as attraction to and the desire to be with women in public is what gets us called “dykes” by homophobes on the street). This includes aromantic and asexual love of women.
 * Pink: inner peace. and acceptance of trans women.
 * White Labrys: empowerment, justice, and intolerance of bigotry

Sol Diaz's flag
On May 28 2021, a Latine dyke on Twitter by the username sol_v_diaz coined an alternative dyke flag with a simplified design. The meaning is as follows:


 * Black: Alienation, rebellion, lack of gender, the aro/ace spectrums, stone dykes, butches, and BBIMP
 * Purple: Mixed or masculine gender, masculinity and femininity, nonbinary & trans dykes, mspec dykes, and futches
 * Pink: Queerness, feminine gender, femininity (including non-female femininity), womanood, love, WLW, and femmes
 * Grey: Confusion, blurred identity, disconnect, greyro/grey ace spectrums, and those who identify with no or multiple gender presentations

Fey defined dyke and the flag as inclusive of "lesbians of all genders and presentations, WLW, AFAB trans people, and transfemmes who identify with/reclaim the term."