‘Dyke is a political identity,’ Organizers and attendees dive deep into what Ottawa’s Dyke March is really about

There is something inherently political about attaching yourself to the word Dyke. But on Saturday, thousands of people did just that, congregating in downtown Ottawa for the annual Dyke March. 

For decades, the word Dyke has been used as a weapon, a derogatory term hurled at Lesbians and Queer women as a way to shame, diminish and police us. But for many in the Queer community, the word has evolved into something else: a reclaimed identity, a cultural marker and, perhaps most importantly, a refusal to be made palatable.

That reclamation is at the heart of the Ottawa Dyke March. Now in its 22nd year, the grassroots event describes itself as a political and community space created by and for Dykes and those who love and support them. For organizer Blue Petties, who has been involved with the organizing committee for the past three years, the march offers something increasingly difficult to find within larger Pride celebrations: space for political plurality.

“Ottawa Dyke March is a grassroots political and community space,” Petties said. “What’s really important for me is it’s always made space for conversations and identities that sometimes can disappear within larger spaces or within spaces that are really purely focused on getting the most number of people in or having the most number of sponsors.”

As Pride celebrations across Canada have grown into major festivals with corporate sponsors, massive crowds and polished programming, grassroots events like the Dyke March have continued to question what Pride is for.

For Petties, the answer has never been singular. The Queer community, they said, has always contained a mosaic of perspectives, from debates around assimilation and liberation to conversations about solidarity and which issues belong within Pride spaces.

“There’s always been a multiplicity of perspectives,” Petties told Queer & Now. “When it comes to assimilation versus liberation, when it comes to solidarity with other causes, and when it comes to these conversations around where do we draw the line between what’s a gay issue, what’s a Queer issue and what’s a trans issue.”

Dykes Just Want to Have Liberation for All

This year, the Ottawa Dyke March is embracing that political legacy under the theme: “Dykes Just Want to Have Liberation for All.”

The event included a rally, a march and a community gathering featuring vendors, musical artists and drag performers. Organizers are also prioritizing local community members whose work extends beyond the stage.

The goal, Pettis said, is to platform local organizers, artists, and performers, particularly those from further-marginalized communities.

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“We always like to have Indigenous speakers at the event,” they explained. “We always like to have people from the Black community and other marginalized communities within the Dyke community and the broader Queer community.”

But before there can be a Dyke March, there is another question worth asking: Who gets to call themselves a Dyke? For Petties, a Trans woman, the answer is expansive. The word itself carries a complicated history. It has been used to target people who were seen as violating traditional gender norms and has long existed at the intersection of misogyny and homophobia. Pettis also pointed to the particular ways misogyny, racism and homophobia shaped the experiences of Black Lesbians historically.

But they say that reclaiming the word does not mean forgetting that history; instead, it means transforming it.

“Language is a way that we express power and control,” Pettis said. “Reclamation can kind of transform the shame and hurt and harm that’s been caused by the term and its use into something where now we can coalesce around it.”

For Pettis, reclaiming Dyke is also an act of reclaiming power from those who once weaponized it.

“It’s almost a reclamation of the language, but then on top of that, it’s a reclamation of the power that language has,” they said.

That reclamation is particularly significant because the Ottawa Dyke March has chosen not to narrow its understanding of who belongs.

The rally, march, and community gathering is open to Dykes, people exploring what the term means to them and those who support the community. Petties said organizers do not police people’s identities, sexualities or presentations.

Their understanding of Dyke, they explained, is intentionally trans-inclusive and expansive, making space for non-binary people and others who may not have previously seen themselves reflected in the term.

“Someone might not see themselves as a Dyke before the Dyke March,” Petties said. “But after seeing the diversity and the inclusivity of our space and how we welcome people that look however they look and appear and become however they are, [they] might actually embrace that term after.”

It is an approach that challenges the assumption that identity must always be fixed, easily categorized or legible to everyone else.

For Petties, Dyke is not simply an identity.

“It’s almost become like a culture and almost a political statement,” they said.

And perhaps that is why alternative Pride events appear to be attracting renewed attention. Petties said the Dyke March has seen increased interest in recent years, alongside other grassroots Queer events such as Trans Marches and community-led celebrations.

“There’s been a lot of conversations around social justice and racism and what it means to be ethical in the different spaces that we show up [in],” Petties said.

The question, however, is often whether those conversations belong at Pride. For the Dyke March, they do.

Petties believes more people are seeking spaces where they can have difficult conversations, express solidarity and engage politically without having those conversations made more palatable for sponsors, corporations or mainstream audiences.

“I think more and more recently, people are really looking for spaces to discuss these things in a meaningful way,” they said. “Sometimes they’re not getting that space.”

The Ottawa Dyke March is not trying to replace mainstream Pride, but it is offering something different.

A space where the word Dyke does not have to be softened into something more comfortable. Where political disagreement and solidarity can exist alongside community celebration. Where organizers, performers and vendors are part of a broader ecosystem rather than simply entertainment for a crowd.

And, importantly, where Dykes remain at the centre.

Still, Petties wants people to know that the march is not closed off from the people who love them.

“You don’t have to be a Dyke to come,” they said. “We obviously are centring Dykes, and it’s our day, it’s our march, but we wanted to be a space where we can gather not only with our community but also the people that love and support us and uplift us.”

And sometimes reclaiming a word means reclaiming everything that comes with it: the history, the pain, the politics, the joy, and the right to define ourselves. Because Dykes, apparently, just want to have liberation for all.

What does “Dyke” mean to you?

Queer & Now spoke with attendees about what the word Dyke means to them, with responses overwhelmingly focused on freedom, community, and reclamation, as well as the political nuances that come with it.

“Dyke to me means freedom. It means being able to be myself and love whoever I want,” Dyke March attendee Samson told Queer & Now.

“[Dyke is] the word I’ve been looking for my whole life,” Tegan shared.

“Resistance, and fighting back and taking back terms that were used against us,” Noah said. “Reclamation, and loving who you want to love.”

“Community, and a protector,” Jade shared.

“A place of community for women and Sapphics, built by women and Sapphics,” Noelle explained. “It’s a total sense of welcoming and an identity that I can feel really safe and proud of.”

“Dyke is a powerful word; it’s like poetry. It is a word that is about not only inclusion, in terms of all of our non-binary, Trans, 2SLGBTQIA+ community, but the word Dyke is also a calling home,” Yami explained.
“It’s a space where I know I feel safe and community will always hold me.”

“Dyke is a political identity. It means both sexual orientation and gender,” Reeva explained. “But beyond that, a commitment to liberation, to freedom, to Queerness as both a personal and political way of being in the world.”

“It means solidarity, it means community,” shared Latoya. 

“Being at the Dyke March in Ottawa, you see the visible presence of Dykes and allies of the Dyke community coming together,” she continued. “The freedom and the liberation of being in community with people who celebrate who you are. That’s what it means to me.”