Reply #115: Your confusion is based on some common, but cliched, misconceptions [View All]

[Der Blaue Engel]

Firstly, women do not "decide to seek a lesbian relationship" any more than they "decide to seek a heterosexual relationship." They have attractions, like men do, to one or the other sex or both and generally have always been this way, whether they have come out earlier or later in lafe. Nor do we have relationships with each other because of an aversion to males. It's actually not about you at all. ;)

Secondly, a butch woman is not a pseudo male, and butch women are not aspiring to be men. (Although this concept can of course become complicated by transgender issues, as transmen are often perceived as being, and may initially identify as, butch women.)

Here's a good overview of the butch/femme dichotomy:

Criticism of butch-femme was usually based on the claim that these identifications are an attempt to replicate heterosexuality by designating one member of a couple as male (the butch) and the other as female (the femme). Even today this argument is frequently aired. However, it is highly problematic because of its own underlying assumption of heteronormativity--that is, the tenet that heterosexuality is normal, and that all other forms of sexuality are only weak imitations of it. Butch-femme need not be an imitation of anything; it is a unique way of living and loving.

While it is impossible to define strictly the essence of butchness, one may examine characteristics that many butches share. More than simply a mode of dressing or a preference in the bedroom, butch identity is often predicated upon a kind of androgynous, powerful energy.

Butches may cross-dress and crop their hair not because they want to be men, but because they are expressing a different way of being a woman, or simply of being gendered. Rather than attempting to replicate traditional masculinity and heterosexuality, butches present a challenge to both in their rejection of how the dominant culture has decided a woman should look and act.

More: http://www.glbtq.com/social-sciences/butch_femme_ssh.html