Gay vs. Lesbian

I'm mostly the same. I rarely use lesbian. It now has taken on tones of men over-sexualising and objectifying gay women. Lesbian can be used as a less formal way of saying homosexuality, but it isn't as casual as "gay".

 

I refer to all people who are attracted to the same sex as homosexual or gay. Lesbian just sounds like a special term that really isn't needed to describe the same thing.

 

Personally, I often describe myself as gay. It's just easier, and I find it far nicer to say. It's not that there is anything wrong with the label 'lesbian'. Just the latest 'coming outs', I've always said 'I'm gay', rather than 'I'm a lesbian'.

 

I use both, but I use lesbian more often because that's what people are used to. I sometimes say "gay" though.

 

Just considering these two choices (since there are other words) --
I use "gay" to refer to homosexuality or homosexuals in general, and "gay male" or "lesbian" to refer to a person (as a noun). I'm not used to using "gay" as a noun -- I've only seen that more recently. When I came out (decades ago) "gay" was usually used more generally (as an adjective) and not to specify men. I sometimes use "gay" (as an adjective) to refer to myself since people already know I'm female; same when talking about a specific lesbian, depending on the sentence.

 

Lesbian is also cool because they have their very own island - the island of Lesbos in Greece. The inhabitants of this island are also known as Lesbians, and some of the people on the island weren't too happy with that and brought on a court case, which they lost.

Lesbos - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Some Greek islands have TWO names. Corfu, for example, is also known as Kerkyra. If the people of Lesbos get all knotted up over this, they can always refer to themselves as Mytilinians, since the island is also known as Mytilini.

There is a Gay Island. In Nunavut of all places. And it's uninhabited. THAT doesn't count.

Gay Island - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

 

I tend to get people's genders mixed up, so using one term for homosexual men and women would be easier for me to remember.

 

:roflmao: Oh my god. That is probably the best thing I have heard all day. :lol:
But I agree, Gay sounds better. Plus its one less syllable and therefore easier to speak.

 

I have one lesbian friend and she told me that 'gay' was offensive to her, so I've always suck to 'lesbian'.

 

I'd prefer to say ''gay'' , but I speak french and in my language it does not sound as right as in english! So I voted ''lesbian''.

And I agree, the word ''lesbian'' does sound a little bit like an illness. It's worse in french : ''lesbienne''.. Right? :roflmao:

 

I tend to say "gay" whether it's a homosexual man or woman. One syllable vs. three.

 

I always hear this noun vs adjective claim, however the truth is that both "gay" and "lesbian" can be used as either a noun or an adjective.

For example in the phrase:

Gays and lesbians marched to celebrate gay and lesbian pride.


The first "Gays and lesbians" = nouns, the second "gay and lesbian" = adjectives.


Anyway, I usually use lesbian if I am referring specifically to female homosexuals. Otherwise there is no point to having an L in LGBT. Lesbians fought hard to get the L put at the front of LGBT, what was the point of that if they're going to identify as G anyway? In that case we should drop the L and just be GBT.

Being a classicist, I think having an ancient Greek reference to describe yourself by is cool anyway (lesbians also have "Sapphist", another ancient Greek word that describes female homosexuality, named for the Greek poetess Sappho who lived on the island of Lesbos).

I wonder if we could construct an analogous term for gay men, but there were so many ancient Greek men engaged in homosexuality in all different places, it would be tough to decide which one to name ourselves after.

But yeah it is fairly common to refer to girls-who-like-girls as "gay" too, so they have a lot more options than guys.

The people who have it bad I think are the bi folks, they are stuck with the clinical term "bisexual", whereas gays and lesbians at least have alternatives to "homosexual".

 

I like to use the term Lesbian. I just think it is weird to call a girl “gay”.

 

I really don't care. I use them interchangeably. I like both.... Hm...I like the word 'lesbian' actually, though. It's kind of cool, with it's origins in Greek Mythology and Sappho and all. Anyone like Xena? Remember that episode when Xena gave Gabrielle one of Sappho's poems? That she'd had Sappho write specially? <3

Anyway, personally I use either. Obviously if a woman tells me she prefers one over the other, I'll use that though.

 

I agree with this

 

Why no 'Both' option?