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Taking ownership and celebrating all of the things that society tries to deter us with is something professional queer Yaz is doing on a daily basis. Breaking down barriers through open conversations and stunning photography, we get the chance to catch up with Yaz and explore their world.
Big Black Butch Bitch – What a statement, why did you choose this for your username?
These are all derogatory terms that people have used to define me my whole life, usually in anger and also reflecting all the ways in which I do not make a “good woman”.
I’m fat, dark-skinned, masculine-presenting, and often deemed a bitch because well, I’m a woman and apparently the two notions are synonymous.
It’s my way of saying yeah, sure – I may be all those things – now what?
It takes away the derogatory power of those words and imbues them with strength, passion and fight. Rather than being something that someone else, usually someone who hates me or wants to diminish me might bestow upon me, it becomes my way of taking command of my narrative with total autonomy.
I am not ashamed to be any of these things, if anything, this is the source of my power.
Plus, who doesn’t love a little alliteration, it rolls off the tongue, contorting it in a salacious manner and forces your mouth into voluptuous formation as you say it. It makes people blush when I use it in ‘professional’ contexts and is as enticingly titillating as it is bombastic – I’d say that sums me up perfectly.
What made you start sharing your life on social media?
I’ve spent most of the lockdown revolving the same three pairs of paint-splattered tracksuits (I fancied myself a DIY Butch for a misguided moment!)
My online presence is quite the opposite, I can let loose with my increasingly expanding wardrobe of delirious lockdown purchases. It’s an opportunity to play with expression and fashion and presentation.
I have spent the last year making more conscious decisions about what I post on socials and what messages I’m trying to get across as I ramble into the ether of the online space.
I felt pretty helpless, so those conscious decisions about fashion, the statements I’m putting out there and my online presence reflect the decisions I make about my life and what I want to achieve with it.
Many find the terms “butch” or “dyke” as derogatory terms, why do you think this is the case?
Dyke, butch – the base of these terms when used as an insult is to say that you aren’t a “good woman”, you aren’t what a woman is meant to be.
I think a lot of people are afraid of these terms because of the power within them.
A lot of people have also been hurt by these words, they are sharp tools to chip away at one’s humanity, and they are often accompanied by violence and vitriol.
People have always referred to me as butch because I’m a woman(?) who wears boy clothes. I find it kinda entertaining, because I’m really quite camp, a bit of a dandy and a fop, so it never necessarily felt like I was doing the label justice.
I’ve recently been redefining what the term butch means to me in ways that don’t relate to traditional understandings of (toxic) masculinity. It’s been a real sassy little adventure, and yeah, I’d say I’m pretty proud of the term now.
I have absolutely no problem being a very bad woman indeed, so I reckon it suits me like a fine cut bespoke suit, actually!
Have you always been this confident?
Yes and no. I think everyone has self-doubt and battles with self-esteem, especially if you live in a body that society has deemed to be unacceptable.
Self-doubt usually isn’t about my outward appearance, but more relating to not being enough on the inside. It’s taken a lot of self-reflection and active practice and hours of rambling on in therapy.
That is in and of itself a relatively recent journey that is manifesting life-changing results, but which I’d always believed was out of my grasp. On the flip side, I’ve always had a sense of well, who cares. I’m never going to fit into expectation, even if that was something I was interested in doing, so I might as well make do with what I’ve got. Maybe even more than make do, make magic?!
You can find Yaz on Social media @bigblackbutchbitch baby! Or check out their business website www.confrontingchange.com for more info on their other projects.
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