I originally posted this on my old blog and thought I should move it over to the new blog. It is about the relationship of lesbian couples in Thailand and the names Tom and Dee that we use. So here it is.
I stumbled across an interesting blog post that has a very detailed explanation of Toms and Dees, you know, the masculine and feminine members of a lesbian relationship. I never thought about it much but I guess people do serious in-depth research on these kind of relationships. The author has a detailed writeup about how Toms and Dees think of their relationship. I guess I knew most of this stuff just because I have known plenty of Toms and Dees, although the stuff from history is new to me. However, I hadn’t really thought about the use of the word “lesbian” and how Toms and Dees use that word. The author says:
“Lesbian” is understood to refer to two feminine women who are engaging in sex with each other. …Toms and dees explained that they could only see this kind of sex as a possibility when it was a performance for a lascivious male audience.
Interesting. Maybe that’s true, because I never heard Toms and Dees use that word to describe themselves.
The article is pretty interesting, although a bit long and academic. So if you are interested in this part of Thai culture take a look.
Tags: lesbian, Thai Culture
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March 24th, 2010 at 9:43 am
There are some lesbian couples where one seems masculine and her partner feminine.
Its odd but I guess some people like to take that route.
Not that I care since its their choice.
March 24th, 2010 at 9:52 am
Right, in Thailand the masculine one is called Tom and the feminine one Dee.
March 24th, 2010 at 12:10 pm
Most of the the masculine partners look pretty touch and kinda ugly while most of the girls look pretty good.
March 24th, 2010 at 5:45 pm
“Lesbian is understood to refer to two feminine women who are engaging in sex with each other. Toms and dees explained that they could only see this kind of sex as a possibility when it was a performance for a lascivious male audience.”
Um, was that a bit harsh? I think the term “lesbian” is about a romantic/intimate relationship between women, and it doesn’t always have to involve any sexual activity. I mean to engage in sex is not a requirement. But now I know why my partner disliked this term (she’s a Thai).
Also is it really “wrong” for a Dee to be engaged in a romantic (and sexual) relationship with another Dee? Because both of us (me and my partner) are not Toms, and don’t want to be ones…
And does a Tom have to be like a man? I mean is it a requirement for a Tom to have short or crew-cut hair? Because there was this Tom from Phuket I had a serious relationship with, and her hair was shoulder-length. She liked to talk and act tough though, despite her cute face.
@Bob Allen
Umm… Pah Tob and Pimai? Tee-hee XD
March 24th, 2010 at 6:58 pm
When I was young I had a Tom friend. We didn’t do anything except go places together so I can’t comment first hand on what a real relationship is like. But I did have a number of friends who were in different kinds of girl-girl relationships. They told me that Tom’s consider their whole purpose is to please their Dee. There is no mutual pleasuring, “he” just does stuff for her and that makes “him” happy. The Tom won’t even undress in front of the Dee because he really is all about being masculine and if he revealed himself as actually being a woman it would ruin the whole illusion.
So yes, I think a Tom is all about being masculine and in Thailand you see many Tom/Dee couples out in public. But there are other arrangements as you know yourself. The Tom/Dee arrangements just seems quite popular.
March 24th, 2010 at 9:30 pm
What i find very interesting in this particualr subject is that people, in genral, can over genralize things. When research is done, people will generally think everyone is like that – stereotyping. Human behaviour reacts like that. I’m pretty sure that T’s & D’s are a minority. Then the term lesbian, gees, just like the term gay, what is that about? Why is lesbian associated to female and gay to male? Why has society even made labels? We don’t have labels for the female dominant in “hetro” couples. Or do we and I missed it on that one?
March 25th, 2010 at 9:34 am
That is an interesting article. I had always thought of Toms and Dees in Thailand as simply the Thai terms for what us Western folks would normally think of as lesbians…. But the article makes it clear, that’s not the case.
What’s more interesting is the article’s assertion that Thai Dees are really normal women, not dedicated lesbians in the Western sense. Or maybe more precisely, what Western people would normally think of as bi-sexual women.
The Dee clearly thinks of herself as a woman, but is open, according to the article, to sexual/romantic relations with either men or Toms (women posing as men).
I guess that’s good news for all the hetero guys out there who have lustfully seen a hot Dee walking around with her Tom girlfriend. Now you can know, the Dee probably would be open to your advances under the right circumstance…
Just be careful not to get beaten to a pulp by her angry Tom…
March 26th, 2010 at 7:25 am
Tom
I’ve seen it happen, getting beaten up by a angry Tom.
April 10th, 2010 at 7:02 am
I’m glad that you liked the article enough to repost it, and I’m interested in seeing people’s reactions to it. But I’d like to stress again that not everything in the post is my words. Some of it (like the part quoted by Pink Samantha) is direct quotation from Megan Sinott’s paper. Those parts are in a different typeface and indented to try to make it as clear as possible which parts are my statements and which are Sinott’s.
In the part that Pink Samantha quoted, Sinott was reporting not her own opinion (let alone mine!), but the opinions that Thai Toms and Dees expressed to her. Whether they are “harsh” or not is not for me to say, but they reflect the beliefs about sex and gender that are current in Thailand today — and as I pointed out in my post, they are not limited to Thailand, or to the present. But the fact that Sinott reports them, and that I quoted Sinott, doesn’t mean that either one of us agrees with them. All they really mean is that if you aren’t interested in Tom-Dee relationships, you probably will find it difficult to be a dyke in Thailand.
April 10th, 2010 at 7:44 am
Thanks for stopping by Duncan. It’s easy to get mixed up on who said what so good to make that clear. I think it is an interesting topic for many people, generates lots of discussion.