Lesbos vs Lesbians

ATHENS (Reuters) - A Greek court is considering a request by residents of the Aegean island of Lesbos to ban use of the word lesbian as a term to describe gay women, a court official said on Wednesday.

Three Lesbos residents brought the case, arguing that the use of the term "lesbian" in reference to gay women insults their identity.

The island of Lesbos, off the Turkish coast, is the birthplace of the ancient Greek poet Sappho, whose love poems inspired the term lesbian. The island has become a mecca for gay women the world over.



The plaintiffs, who argue the northern Aegean island's residents are the only true Lesbians, told the court the dispute was over identity and not sexuality.

"Gay women have every right to define themselves as they wish, but they don't have the right to appropriate our national identity," Lesbos resident Ioannis Achlioptas said.

At the packed courtroom, one of the islanders wore a badge that read "I am Paul and I am a Lesbian" and later unfurled a banner which read "If you are not from Lesbos, you are not a Lesbian".

"I have a hard time explaining to my daughter that we Lesbians are not homosexuals. My mother, my sister and my daughter are all Lesbians and it's incredible the amount of ridicule they suffer because of this," Achlioptas told the court.

...story continued by the ZZW...

Meantime, the defendants claim they're allowed to associate their sexuality to whomever or whatever they so please.

"We really enjoyed our recent trip to Holland," says Mindy Lovdapuss, founder of gay rights group Bitches United To Create Hilarity. "So for a while, we were calling ourselves 'dykes'."

In a released statement, B.U.T.C.H. says it will continue to use the term lesbian, no matter what ruling the Greek courts hand down.

While certainly rare, this type of case is not without precedent.

In 1994, residents of the quaint town of Dildo, Newfoundland, successfully argued in the Supreme Court of Canada that an American sex toy company was tarnishing the name of their community.



The Supreme court ruled in favour of the town, and forced the company to begin marketing 'vibrators' instead of 'dildos'.

When asked if aware of the Dildo case, Lovdapuss replied matter-of-factly: "Of course. It helps me sleep at night."