LESBIANS AND THE BIG BANG

When I have a had a bad day at work, and I want to let off some steam or I want to forget my troubles, I am going to go to a bar, pick up a guy and bang him until the sun comes up. If I went on a business trip, and I met a man at a conference and he came on to me and I did nothing to resist his charms, I would go to his hotel room and I would slip out before the wake up call came.

There is absolutely nothing wrong with these scenarios. I am an adult, it was consensual sex and condoms were used. The only problem is that I am a lesbian. A lesbian. I am someone who is attracted to women--physically and emotionally. People who know me, know that I am a lesbian. In fact, I am surprised that there isn't a big L on my driver's license. I am the kind of lesbian that likes George Clooney--I think he is attractive and appealing, but I do not have any romantic notions about him. I see what straight women see in him, but I would like him as a friend, not a lover. And that is because...I am a lesbian.

I am the kind of lesbian who has no problem watching romantic films about straight couples or reading a love story about a man and a woman. That has been our media and culture for many years, that is what has been available to us. But I was the lesbian who would dream about a Pride and Prejudice where Mr. Darcy was just Darcy--a beautiful mysterious woman. I would wonder why Sally couldn't meet another Sally? I would always hope for a time in my life where lesbians would have their stories told and eventually that did happen. There have been wonderful films in the last few years that have shown lesbians as real people. The publishing world has finally discovered that lesbians love romances and television has slowly found its spine. Television executives now know that lesbians can help ratings or at least not hurt ratings.

But the thing that continues to piss off this lesbian is this ridiculous idea that lesbians will continue to have sex with men--as a way to cope with stress, to show they have or need power over men, and a way to confirm that they are indeed a lesbian.

This leads me to Pepa. LHDP shook up our world with her having butcher block sex in the kitchen with Aitor. I hated this storyline for two reasons: it was just stupid for Pepa to believe that she had to get pregnant "the old fashioned way" and she then had sex with Aitor because she was drunk and distraught.

I know lesbian couples who have gone to the sperm bank, chosen a donor, brought home the sperm in a cooler, purchased a new turkey baster and the greatest hits of Enya. They light some candles, make love, open sesame and hello sperm! No shots, no doctors and no stirrups. All of Pepa's fears were without base. But the bigger issue is that Pepa was a lesbian who was in love with a woman, and in her lowest moment she had sex with a man. And now there is talk that Pepa could be doing that again in Season 9.

I will accept Pepa doing this as long as straight men will turn to men in times of stress. When I see a straight stud make a move on a gay man, then I will see more of a balance in storytelling. To actually believe that a lesbian is lusting, fantasizing or even horny for a man's body is as hard to believe as George Clooney seducing Rupert Everett--because he had a bad day.

I am not saying that every lesbian in the world has not ever been with a man. I am saying that when a film or TV show has one or two lesbians, they should be lesbian, with "lesbian tendencies". They should be women loving women. If the world media overwhelmingly represents the straight life, is it too much to ask for a few good lesbians? To show lesbians who only want to make love to lesbians? To show lesbians walking in the house and yelling "honey, I'm home" and there comes another lesbian around the corner with a smile on her face. Am I being too pushy to ask for a lesbian wedding that doesn't have buckets of blood?

Because there has been such a struggle for equality and fair representation in the media for gays and lesbians, it is disheartening and unsettling to hear about another wonderful beautiful lesbian who will have meaningless sex with a man. Whey can't she have meaningless sex with a woman?

No woman could love Silvia the way Pepa did and then say "I am in mourning for my woman, so I will now have sex with men." That is not how lesbians mourn. Lesbians mourn like everyone else--we cry, we eat, we drink, we sleep, and we are tremendously sad. We are not shagging, banging or blowing men.

Let Pepa be a lesbian. Let lesbians be lesbians.