Inspiring Girl Friends of Dorothy
The stellar lesbians and Girl Friends of Dorothy who I cite herein covering the arts, science, sports ... will INSPIRE you! Never forget the heroism of the brave lesbians who, in history, fought for our Lesbian & Gay Rights, Lesbian / Gay Visibility and Women's Rights and showed their solidarity with others who are unjustly prosecuted.
Prick Up Your Ears - slick lesbians, and girl friends of Dorothy, in world history:
- Ruled countries - Queen Christina of Sweden (1626 - 1689)
- Conquered gigantic mountains- Freda du Faur (1882 - 1935)
- Jetted to outer space (twice!) - astronaut Sally Ride (1951 - )
Buzzkill: To [ADJECTIVE] Content Creators & Social Media Influencers
Before I continue. I'm a, hmmm... "tad" fed-up. I appreciate the lust for web traffic and social media "influencer fame". So a message to you, Rudy. Content Creators: clickbait content is lame, regurgitation is lame but now we are also witnessing the new pish impact of fighting naff Google AI (non-human) Overviews in search results and loss of traffic to cool human written content sites (not yet, for social media Influencers). Social Media Influencers: I've conscientiously shied away from TikTok & YouTube - so your domain. Grover's I've written this site from my own hard research and questioning. I can see clearly from my regular SEO rankings monitoring in Google search results where my content has been skimmed :( How would you feel, in my place? If you are using this content as a key source / inspiration for your own blog / social post, FFS, please have the courtesy and respect to link to this page. But even cooler - find your own nuance on sapphic topics which will stand you legitimately and admirably, high.
After that brief interlude, continuing ...
In World History, Slick Lesbians, and Girl Friends of Dorothy:
• Kicked men's asses, on land (Deborah Sampson (1760 - 1827)) and sea (pirates Mary Read & Anne Bonny)
• Saved lives - Florence Nightingale (1820 - 1910)
• Won Nobel Prizes - Selma Lagerlöf (1858 - 1940)
• Wrote great poetry & novels - Sappho (570 BC) & Radclyffe Hall (1880 - 1943)
• Made great art - painter Rosa Bonheur (1822 - 1899) & sculptor Emma Stebbins (1815 - 1882)
• Made great music records - Opera Singer, Mademoiselle Maupin (1670 - 1707) & The queen of the Blues, Bessie Smith (1894 - 1937)
• Broke sports records - Martina Navratilova (1956 - )
• Fought for their rights - Frances Harper (1825 - 1911)
• Challenged gender roles - Anne Lister (1791 - 1840)
and...
• Sapphically LOVED openly in, the 1770s - The Ladies of Llangollen (Eleanor Butler and Sarah Ponsonby).
What Does "A Friend of Dorothy" Mean?
Perhaps you are asking yourself - who's Dorothy? / what does a "Friend of Dorothy" / "Are you a Friend of Dorothy?" mean? In America, a "Friend of Dorothy" was a fab old skool gay secret code for identifying a GAY MAN when homosexuality was illegal. Thereafter, "Friend of Dorothy", expanded to include lesbians too.
The phrase, "Friend of Dorothy", dates back to at least World War II (1940s), derived from Judy Garland's character, Dorothy, in The Wizard of Oz or ... was it, slick Dorothy Parker? A "Friend of Dorothy" was a coded term to refer to a homosexual, when homosexuality was still criminalised in the US and UK and, homosexuality couldn't be openly discussed. So, at the time, on meeting someone ... stating that, or asking if, someone was a "Friend of Dorothy" was a slick euphemism used for sussing out someone's sexual orientation, without others knowing its meaning. Indeed, in the past I've whispered to partners in crime ... "Do you think she is a friend of Dorothy?", when I was very shy and conversing in v slick Edinburgh hetty (straight) bars and restaurants! Hey-ho, I'm still shy and recalling those times. Indeed, just before launch, on impulse, I decided to call this site "Girls Friends Of Dorothy".
My Terminology Throughout My Site: Perhaps Controversial?
Straightforward: herein, "Hetty" = a straight person (a bonnie Scottish slang term -lucky them: no need for declarations nor subjected to ugly / bullying euphemisms).
So what noun to assign these ace, gutsy, stellar LGBTQ ladies I have included herein? Holy Moly! You may say... TomaYto, I say ... TomaHto. I deliberated long, and consulted gay friends over this (of course, over crémant). Bare in mind we've been called by so many terms: lesbian, lezzie / lezzy / leso / les / lezzer, dyke (slap my wrist! but I do find now "Dyke" amusing as I am an ex-geologist) and of course ignoring, holy moly, crass: bean flicker, carpet muncher, pussy puncher, muff diver ... and, so many euch, more!!! See Lesbian terms throughout history. Though some historical terms may now sound slightly amusing e.g. lezzy - for many, these labels were stabbingly hurtful to those who were harassingly called this to their face or behind their backs. A vino dilemma:
* Sapphic: Out of pure shyness regarding future work interviews, I started off using the term "Sapphic" for these stellar ladies as it seemed "safe".
* Lesbian: Personally (fair play if you wish to slap my wrist!), I really dislike the actual sound of the word "lesbian". I genuinely salute those who say it out loud and proud / have reclaimed it. Honestly, "Sapphic" was getting me absolutely nowhere SEO-wise i.e. in Google search rankings as Google preferred the keyword "Lesbian". Hands-up: I utterly wish, as many people to view this site as I think it's cooly different and informative. V reluctantly and slowly, however, I've replaced "Sapphic" with "lesbian" (though I will never, ever call myself this). Interestingly, since the launch of this site on NYE 2020, in Google search rankings, the term "Sapphic" is now well-used among high traffic sites, and is now recognised by Google as synonym for "lesbian".
* Cake: Incidentally, growing-up, as I hated the word "lesbian" so much, I developed my own goofy codeword, (unaware of Anne Lister and her cleverly coded diaries). I referred to myself as being ... "cake" - a private dippy code word that I got my kind gay friends to use in my presence (shame on me!). "Cake" derived from my first ever bestie gay girl friend, who goofily misheard me, in a schickimicki Edinburgh Cafe bar. Excitedly, and for the first time, I pointed out a very lush waitress, to my friend but alas she thought I was referring to v yummy CAKE on display on the food counter. We so laughed and I liked it as a code word, so shoot my shyness, for a few years, "Cake" became my ace code word when out and about with friends in hetty bars.
* Gay: Gaining a bit more confidence, through my fab Milanese gay boy friends, I then progressed to labelling myself as "gay" (with an affectionate nod to fab Cole Porter). Yeh, I hear you ... "gay" is associated with "male homosexuality". But, I like the term "gay" which originally meant e.g. jolly and, technically "homosexual" means a person who is sexually or romantically attracted to people of their own sex. For SEO, "gay" is utterly PANTS regarding "Women who love Women".
* Queer: I did embrace the en vogue term "queer" during my "Ghetto" & "Popstars" London club nights which blared out fab indie BritPop and dancing with my bestie, uber sweet 'n cool (Baroque Boy) dance partner-in-crime. Between COVID lockdowns I deliberated with Baroque Boy over my choice of nouns (like the term "queer") when I was launching this site in 2020 and both of us liked the edginess of the term and it covered gay boys and girls. Five years on, in 2026, I must say I was really surprised when I recently discovered that the both of us, independently, have stepped away from the "queer" labelling of ourselves. Is it maturing of age and or recalling that the Oxford English Dictionary's original definition of "queer" as being "strange / odd / peculiar", that no longer resides with us?
* Groover: YOU Choose Your Own Label: Rainbow poppers, popping - YOU, choose with pride and great strength, your own label.
Dare I confess, due to labelling and changing acronyms, it's sometimes hard to SEO. So, within this site I refer to these ladies as Lesbian or Sapphic (to cover those who may have been bi or had a "wee dabbling") and ocassinally Queer. My label? When I've had to rarely OUT myself e.g. during pre-op appointments: oops, starting to blush soooo hot, nervously, I can't stop myself from bizarrely, doing "camp jazz hands" (why?) and, blurt out, "I'm ... GAY"! Hugest phew and hugs to my medics, as they have always, warmly said ... cool.
IMAGE COPYRIGHT HOLDERS :(
PPPPPPPPPPlease show some goodwill to this site. HUGEST Thank you - the images used herein are for enlightenment and inspiration and not for commercial purposes. The site would look so sad & dull without images of these courageous lesbians. See in the footer - you can email me and I will immediately remove the relevant image, if wished.
Private Web Searching: Heads-Up On Incognito Google vs VPNs (Virtual Private Networks)
Are you living in a country that awfully monitors your internet activity e.g. for "Lesbian [searches]" / "gay [searches]"?
* Incognito Google: don't trust any Incognito Browser! Please consider using a VPN which stands for Virtual Private Network.
* Virtual Private Network: A VPN (Virtual Private Network) strives to encrypt (conceal) YOUR internet traffic/ web searches and (strives to) disguise your online identity - this makes it more difficult for third parties / government censorship to track your activities online (in democrat countries your traffic /searches could be seen as legal but for certain governments it as illegal). When I was growing up, I had so little exposure to sapphic / lesbian media and, no gay friends to hang out with. It was still a taboo subject. Bravo, that there is now more exposure "OUT" there, particularly online. Yet it is still shocking that 70 countries still have national laws criminalising same-sex relations between consenting adults. Moreover, there is still painful queer bashing. In 2018 - 19, in the UK alone, it was reported 14,491 crimes committed against people because of their sexual orientation. How many were unreported?
* Cover Your Tracks Online: If you are living in an internet censored county, consider using a trusted VPN. Also if you are not yet OUT to your family / school friends consider covering your tracks online.
You Got To ... Link It, Link It, Link It :)
This sapphic site has grown so much bigger than I had envisaged. Please do revisit as I grow it. There are still lesbian women I have to add to the "Trailblazers" section, still countless historical LGBT Women who I have not yet discovered, who have not been documented and are coming to light. And, there are some ... who I suspect as they never married and I await what further research (evidence) reveals. I don't want to brand someone unjustly lesbian (we all understand the brutal hurt it can cause). Please forgive any errors on any misinterpretations.
Groovers, please support this site and DO LINK To It. I am an unfunded, lone wolf and am too shy to market this site through social media. No way, José do I wish to be a wannabe social media "influencer" yet my content is being used / scrapped by clickbait content writers and social media "influencer" plagiarists with out credit - my site was launched NYE 2020 - see when there posts were uploaded.
This Sapphic Lockdown Web Project Journey:
* 2020 uK Covid Lockdown 2 (Furlough): I started (designed + css hand-coded + wrote content + SEO'd) this site during uK Covid Lockdown 2 Furlough. I had been working as an SEO on the bestest website I had ever worked on - a slick international talent booking website. To keep my mind active while waiting excitedly to return back to work, I thought this would be a cool coding project to learn css coding (I was a queen of old-skool HTML tables) and clandestinely celebrate lesbian history and culture by documenting some slick lesbian 'Friends of Dorothy' and sapphic media which have comforted and roused me when I was too shy to come out. Please do forgive me - I am an SEO and not a writer (and have made many typos), but I hope this site and these slick ladies will inspire you.
* 2020 uK lockdown 3 (Furlough), NYE 2020: even though incomplete and a 1st draft, alone in my flat, to say goodbye to heaven knows a miserable year, I launched this site; with light abdomen pain (OMG, what was coming health wise, quite frankly Miss Shankly has been shocking!); Moet numbing my tooth ache (I couldn't get a fooking emergency dentist appointment during COVID 2020 Xmas) and lovely neighbours' NYE fireworks. "The fire is the future, and the present, is the flame".
Please forgive me, if occasionally I dribble on about my own experiences - oops, I wear my heart on my sleeve.
A Wee Bit Of Sapphic Help
Some of these pages offer some support links, e.g.:
* Private Browsing Tips
* Coming Out FAQ Tips
* Some UK LGTBQ+ Helplines (v sorry, I tried to be International but it was v hard).
