Katherine Moennig.

I kept hearing the term of "tomboy" but honestly I didn`t know what it means until I googled it. Apparently, not many people can clearly spot the difference between being a tomboy and being a gay woman (to be honest, neither could I, until recently, but I`m glad I can now). There definitely is a big difference between these two terms.

A tomboy is a girl that likes to dress like a boy and sometimes do boy stuff, such as playing footbal, baseball or go hunting, therefore she`s very sporty and more physically active than the other girls. Otherwise stated, a tomboy presents some characteristics that are seen by the society as being typically male characteristics.

As expected, there is a perceived connection between tomboys and gay women, but most of the time it turns out that tomboys are heterosexual women, so they date men. However, few of them come out as lesbian later in life, but their typically masculine attitude is definitely not an indicator of their sexuality. Same goes for boys that act a bit like girl.

Throughout time, tomboys have been somehow stigmatized because of their behaviour, due to the perception of the society, and this is why they were wrongly associated with gay women or even with transgenders or gender-fluids. The whole situation has changed, though, when the modern psychologists have proven that there is absolutely nothing out of the ordinary for a girl to be a tomboy.

To sum up, the conclusion is that a girl that acts like a boy is not necessarily gay, and a boy that likes to be feminine isn`t necessarily gay either. It might  just be a personal preference. A gay woman can be tomboy-ish, but she can as well be very, very feminine. Appearances can be deceiving!

P.S.: Click here for more useful information.

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