Futch

Futch is a term use to describe a lesbian, bisexual, or otherwise sapphic woman (or feminine-aligned non-binary person) who presents with a mix of feminine (femme) and masculine (butch) traits. They typically dress and present themselves in a way that is gender neutral or androgynous, not going too far towards masculine or feminine, or they may present more strongly femme sometimes and more strongly butch other times. Futch people can be cisgender or transgender.

Other Terms
The term "chapstick lesbian" is typically synonymous with futch, and is based on the term "lipstick lesbian".

Lipgloss Lesbian
Someone who is in between butch and femme but leans more towards femme.

Stem
A stem is a form of futchness that is specific to black women. It is in between femme and stud. Stud is a term dedicated to black women in particular, and is seen as cultural appropriation for non-black people to adopt the term.

History
Although some incorrectly believe that the term futch was created for "futch scale" meme as a joke, there are urban dictionary definitions of "futch" matching the current definition from at least 2007, several year prior to the meme. Additionally, in an issue from the Advocate from August 20, 2002 a 41 year old lesbian identifies as "futch", defined as "a feminine butch".

Flag and Symbol
The pink and brown futch flag was created by spencerhastings on or before January 11, 2018. It was a combination of the butch flag and the femme flag (unclear which versions).

An alternate futch flag was created by Mermista of the Tumblr blog plurgai on Jun 27th, 2020. It was made using colors from the butch and femme flags (unclear which versions). The top color came from mixing the heavy femme and stone butch colors.

Another alternate futch flag was created by genderqueer-dream on July 28th, 2020. There is no known meaning.

The "horizon futch" flag or "all-inclusive" futch flag was created by pridewiki on or before December 23, 2020. Purple represents the inclusion of all futches, including POC, disabled, fat, GNC, and all other futches. Blue represents the butch and femme roots and history. Futch has roots from both, but it is also it’s own whole identity. Green represents support for femmes, butches, other futches, and the wider community. Yellow represents inclusivity and tolerance. Orange represents autonomy and independence. Red represents futch history and culture. Red-pink represents LGBTQ+ history.

A proposed futch symbol is a combination of the butch and femme symbols, which were both created on October 4, 2014 by a group of non-binary Brazilians.