Lesbian/Bisexual Woman of the Decade — a call for nominations

List being updated here: please comment on that post

What started out as a semi-facetious comment in response to the #biggaybattle on Twitter (wherein I pointed out that, once again, we were discussing a choice between two cis gay white men, and asked where the poll for Lesbian/Bisexual Woman of the Decade was — and why I wasn’t on it) has turned into a more serious compilation of important, influential, or just plain notable lesbian and bisexual women of the past decade. For once, rather than just wondering why someone wasn’t doing it, I decided to do it myself. Because I can, that’s why.

Note: the term “lesbian and bisexual women” is problematic. There are many nonstraight/queer women who do not identify as either: for example, a woman might not identify as a lesbian because she is not only women-attracted, but neither identify as bisexual because it falsely presupposes only two sexes. My primary reason for using this term is simply because the men’s poll that inspired this used “Gay/Bisexual Man”. All non-straight identifying women, both cis and trans, are explicitly welcome as nominees.

The women nominated thus far:

Ellen DeGeneres

Gloria Anzaldúa

Beth Ditto

Melissa Etheridge

Mary Cheney

Wanda Sykes

Denise Denton

Angelina Jolie

kd lang

Sook-Yin Lee

Margaret Cho

Alison Bechdel

Rachel Maddow

Suze Orman

Libby Davies

Ani DiFranco

Portia de Rossi

Julia Serano

Lily Tomlin

Dorothy Porter

Sandi Toksvig

Johanna Sigurdardottir

Carol Ann Duffy

On looking at this list, I have a few thoughts: 1) That’s a damn lot of women. I think I’ll narrow it down to, say, 10 for the final poll. 2) That’s a damn lot of white cis women. 3) When it’s 2am and you’re sick and tired and trying to find links which verify the sexuality of fiftybajillion women half of whom you’ve never heard of before, Wikipedia, for all its faults, is your friend.

So here’s what I’m thinking: I want more nominations. I especially want more nominations of lesbian/bisexual/queer women who are trans, who are from outside the US, and/or who are WOC/nonwhite. (And when I say “who are trans”, I mean “who are trans lesbians/bisexual/queer/nonstraight women”. Yay for straight trans women, but that’s not what this is about.) And, I want you, if so inclined, to tell us why you think someone should/shouldn’t be the Lesbian/Bisexual Woman of the Decade, and should/shouldn’t be in the final voting list.

And then I’m going to make a poll, and then you’re going to vote, and you’re going to tell all your friends to vote, and you’re going to tell all your favorite bloggers to blog about it and encourage their readers to vote, and you’re going to go lobby all the celebrities you know on Twitter to vote for your favorite nominee, and we’ll get #bigdykebattle or some such to trend, and we will take over the world have our turn at semi-randomly picking a probably-privileged community representative about whom we can make highly suggestive remarks.

Because we can, that’s why.

***

ETA Further nominees from comments and Twitter:

little light

Rebecca Walker

Amelie Mauresmo

Clare Balding

Greta Christina

Narelda Jacobs

And two paired nominations:

Mila and Jayna L-Pavlin

Ann Louise Gilligan and Katherine Zappone

There are several nominees I am not including because I cannot verify that they are explicitly and publicly out as queer/bisexual/lesbian women, or who came out at the end of the decade. I have no desire to inadvertently out anyone, nor to shove into the spotlight someone who has not willingly chosen to publicly align themselves with the queer community (regardless of their private sexuality). That said, many of these names are new to me, and while I’m doing my best to verify and to include only those women who are explicitly, openly out as queer, I am fully aware I may make errors, and beg for your assistance in correcting them.

Nominations will close at 11:59pm PST on Sunday January 10th 2010 (ooo, 2010!); poll will come up soon after.

List being updated here: please comment on that post