In the age of social media, going against consensus is scary. When popular lesbian YouTuber Arielle Scarcella posted a video on February 21 of this year—“I’m a Lesbian Woman & I’m Leaving The INSANE “Progressive” Left”—she braced for the worst. Instead, she found intellectual liberation and unexpected support.

Scarcella posted the video after her February talk at the Sydney Gay and Lesbian Mardi Gras was cancelled in a sequence of genuinely frightening events: the petition to ban her talk was launched by drag performer Johnny Valkyrie, who, in January, hosted “Drag Storytime” for children at the Brisbane National Library. The event’s protestors, who chanted “drag queens are not for kids,” were filmed and harassed. As a result, the next day, one of the protestors—an openly gay student named Wilson Gavin—committed suicide. 

After Sydney Mardi Gras cancelled Scarcella’s event, Valkyrie’s petition announced “Thank you everyone! We deplatformed, unsponsored, and disaffiliated transphobia at Sydney Mardi Gras 2020,” despite numerous trans people arguing online that Arielle was not at all transphobic. Notably, the “queer POC” women who organized the panel refused to disinvite Arielle and moved the event to a private space.

Sadly, Arielle’s story isn’t uncommon. Many people—sometimes part of a marginal community themselves—have had some sort of terrible experience where they were punished for challenging an orthodoxy defined by its most extreme members. Scarcella made the point clear in her video: “I don’t think like these people, and I don’t want to be associated with them. This community has become extremely intolerant while preaching love.”

We spoke to Scarcella about the response to her viral video, the biggest problems in the online “woke” movement, whether or not she identifies as conservative, and why cancel culture is dying like Lord Voldemort.

Arielle, thanks for speaking with Countere. You’ve been YouTubing for around 10 years. Ideologically, where were you when you started?

In the beginning, there was no talk about anything other than LGB (lesbian, gay, bi) and transsexual people—people that were transitioning physically. Really, I feel like there weren’t any misunderstandings between people in the community until this new movement of queer identity came in the last 5 years.

It became infiltrated by young teens, who—when I was in high school—would be the “emo kids.” And a lot of them aren't even queer—they don’t have gender dysphoria. They just want a label to put on themselves to feel more included or to gain oppression points or to make sense of their depression. I think a lot of them do need help and they're very degrading—they disrespect people that have come before them, that have set the path for us to even exist in the world openly. 

And that’s where this started to become very visible to me—when I saw them spewing hate to people that were quite literally at Stonewall.

Were you being harassed by these people?

Oh, yeah. I was harassed daily, and still am. They should have the right to do that. But I also think they should should be open to conversation. Whenever I I ask them to have a conversation they say “You don't listen.” I say “I do listen but I don’t have to agree with you.”

They're mistaking empathy with agreement. I can empathize with their situation and feel bad for them. But that doesn’t mean I’m going to agree with them. Their entitlement is that if you don't agree with everything they say, you’re seen as a hateful person and a bigot.  And that’s not the right way to do it at all.

I’ve noticed that. If you disagree with someone, it becomes “You want the erasure of me, you want my death.” Center-right figures, even Jewish people, get called Nazis. Conservative people of color get called white supremacists. 

It goes 0-100 real quick.

What were some of the first incidents in your career where you got attacked for saying things you thought were harmless?

I remember a bunch of YouTubers came for me back in 2015. I made a video—I think it was called “Trans men are not butch lesbians.” Trans men didn't understand why I was comparing them to butch lesbians. They said, “You shouldn't compare us to butch lesbians, that means you see us as women.” And I was like, “No, I don’t." But when people are visually seeing you—if you you’re not on testosterone, if you haven’t had surgeries—they’re going to think you’re a butch lesbian.

The whole point of the video was to say gender identity is not the same as gender expression. That just because trans men and butch lesbians might look similar, they are still different. And they went off on me for even comparing them, and I was like—“I’m comparing to show how different you are!”

Let’s talk about your viral video, “Why I’m Leaving the Left.” I saw that you made it after Sydney Mardi Gras cancelled your event.

Yeah, I was in Sydney a few weeks ago. The cancellation happened right before I put the video out, and it just made me want to publish it even more. I was like, “This is my last straw, I’m so glad that I'm posting this.”

Why was your event cancelled?

My understanding is that some people were going to throw a tantrum [if my event didn’t get cancelled.] So they took my event off their official page. They were like, “We just want peace at Mardi Gras, so if this person’s pissing off other people we’re going to get rid of her.” They didn’t even look into the situation.

It was literally the only fully lesbian event at Mardi Gras. I just wanted to talk about lesbian issues. And somehow I’m the one who’s bigoted. 

So you put up the video, which went viral on Twitter and Youtube. What happened then?

I actually got nothing but praise from my viewers. From the far left, from the people that hated me already, I didn’t really see anything. And I think it's because I had so much support on the video. I had like 6 or 7 celebrities follow me after that video. I thought that I was gonna get even more bullied and it just didn't happen.

Which is really interesting, but it makes sense, right? Bullies are bullies. When they see people standing behind you, the bullies aren’t going to come out. 

I think there’s a lot of people who agree with you but are just afraid to say it. 

Exactly. It's important for me to be a voice for people that are still afraid to speak. That’s more important than anything.

When the video came out, you said you were a bit concerned for your future. Were there any repercussions to posting the video?

That’s crazy, right? I shouldn’t have to worry about coming out as a free speech advocate. I was worried about brand deals, but I think I’m okay. All the companies that have worked with me in the past are just happy I’m making sex-positive content.

I don’t think my business will change as much as I thought it would. It’s just the super hardcore leftists who already didn’t like me, don’t like me even more. And I wasn’t going to change their opinion of me anyway, so why was I even trying at that point?

I only stopped working with one company. When the video came out, [its founder] was basically like, “I understand why you posted it. I understand that it’s sexist how people treat lesbians, but you can’t you play nice?”

At that point I said, “No, I can't play nice because female rights are being taken away. And the word “woman” is being changed. How do you not see how that affects women?”

Let’s talk about that. How are lesbians treated in the LGBTQ movement?

Lesbians are taken the least seriously out of every sexual orientation. If you go and tell someone that you’re lesbian, most of the time they’ll be like—“Oh, you’re bisexual?” Literally every time. But If a guy tells you he’s gay, you don't say, “Oh, do you date women?”

I think there's a number of reasons for that. One of them is because of the way lesbians are perpetuated in porn. I don’t think lesbian porn is a bad thing—if people enjoy it, good for them. But if somebody tells you they identify as a lesbian, don’t go and change the word. 

I would expect that in the “pecking order” of intersectionality, lesbians would be seen “above” gay men. But it seems like gay men have a ton of power in the movement.

They do. Gay men have the most power. I'm grateful that there are quite a few gay men that are starting to speak up for lesbians. And there are also quite a few straight men, which is great.

I think this all started when trans activists—and that doesn’t mean trans people, let’s make that clear. Trans activists is an umbrella term: people that are all about “gender and not sex,” regardless of their actual gender.

The trans activists started coming for gay men, then they started coming for straight people, so it was just a matter of time before they came for us. They said things like “If you’re a lesbian, you should be attracted to all women. If a trans woman is a woman, you should be attracted to her.”

And it’s like, “No, we’re not attracted to all women.”

If you want to call yourself straight and have sex with trans women—I don’t care! People misunderstand my stance on that. I don't care how you identify, as long as you’re not forcing your definition on me. That’s the problem I have. Because you’re changing a word and saying I have to live by your new definition.

Can we talk a little bit about the changing definition of the word “woman?”

Yes. I saw something posted the other day that “Women are limitless and formless.” And it’s like—“Thanks for saying that! How are we supposed to protect something that’s limitless and formless and a void?”

I know it’s meant to be seen as a good thing, but it’s not. You can’t protect something that doesn’t have a definition. Women have different needs. Trans women have different needs. Men have different needs. 

Do you identify as a conservative?

I took two political stance tests. I got libertarian on both of them.

I’m very open and very liberal socially. “Live and let live.” But I also think that people need to pay their taxes and work. I’ve seen people abuse welfare and I’ve seen veterans get pushed onto the street. I don’t think trans women belong in female sports all the time, and I don’t think they belong in women’s prisons if they’re rapists. I have some conservative views but it’s not an overall mindset. I’m in the middle.

I'm working with conservatives, not because that's how I identify, but because that's the way to come together. When you speak to “the enemy,” you find out that there’s not as much hate as you think…for example, in regards to abortion, they don’t hate women. They just don’t want babies to die. I get that. I disagree with them, but they’re not coming from a place of hate. 

I’m trying to get people to take a step back and actually have conversations with people they disagree instead of yelling at each other. I’ve never been a fan of that.

I noticed that you use the phrase “LGBT” instead of “LGBTQ.” What is the rationale for that?

I don’t like the word “queer” personally. I just say “LGBT.” I think every sexual orientation pretty much fits under that umbrella. Like, pansexual is the type of bisexuality. Queer is a type of bisexuality. Asexuality is not really a sexuality, it’s lack of a sexuality. 

Not that someone shouldn’t be proud of being an asexual, but they’re not oppressed. 

That’s a problem—the word “oppression” gets thrown around too easily.

Yeah. It’s not weird, it’s fine. But you’re not oppressed. The only way you’d be oppressed if if you were in an arranged marriage, with someone forcing you to have sex. 

It’s ironic, because the greater Western world is the most accepting modern society of LGBTQ people.

Definitely. But then people get entitled and they they just start coming up with reasons to fight. 

LGBT isn't even really a movement anymore—we already got our rights. These people are just going to make it go backwards. Which is really upsetting.

What’s the biggest problem with the leftist “woke” movement?

I think their biggest problem is that their entire movement is full of hypocrisy. When they call someone a bigot, it’s them usually being bigoted. They use the word “racist” for anything. And they constantly preach about intersectionality, but they only focus on things that are immutable—“We want more black people, we want all these different genders”—but they want everyone to think the same way. Is that truly intersectional?

Meanwhile there’s plenty of conservative black and trans people. But they only lift up the voices of the people they agree with. Otherwise they’d be lifting up Blair White and they hate her. 

How about some intersectionality in regards to thoughts and views? Everybody has the same exact opinion and everything and if they don't, they’re excluded. And then it becomes an even smaller group…they’re eating their own and they’re kicking people out for not being perfect. 

That is their downfall. Even if somebody is not Republican or conservative, they don’t want to be a “left” person anymore. 

Do you think that this “woke” and cancel culture is growing stronger or weaker?

Weaker. Definitely. But I think the voices are getting louder. 

I think of them like Voldemort in Harry Potter. Every time you destroy a Horcrux, he gets stronger but he’s still dying. So they’ll be louder and louder, but there’s less and less people associated with them as time goes on. 

In your opinion, how can others support LGBTQ people without pandering to these “woke activists?” 

I would say follow us on social media and listen to the conversations we’re having. I think the more rational voices in the LGBT community are being clouded by these loud activists that aren't even LGBT most of the time. And that’s a shame, because the people that are speaking above us right now are hurting our movement.

Follow Arielle Scarcella on Twitter and YouTube.