The Michigan Womyn's Music Festival (MWMF) is an international feminist music festival occurring every year in August in Michigan. It is mostly attended by lesbians and lesbian-separatists. Although the location is not a total secret, it is common courtesy to not mention it in order to protect the safety of the over 3,000 women who attend and those who voluntarily work at the festival for up to a month each year. Feminism is a social theory and political movement primarily informed and motivated by the experience of women. ... A music festival is a festival that presents a number of musical performances usually tied together through a theme or genre. ... August is the eighth month of the year in the Gregorian Calendar and one of seven Gregorian months with the length of 31 days. ... State nickname: Wolverine State or Great Lakes State Other U.S. States Capital Lansing Largest city Detroit Governor Jennifer Granholm Official languages English Area 250,941 km² (11th)  - Land 147,255 km²  - Water 103,687 km² (41. ... This article is about homosexual women, not inhabitants of the Greek island of Lesbos A lesbian (lowercase L) is a homosexual woman. ...

As a response to misogyny, sexism and homophobia, MWMF was created in 1975 by 19-year-old Lisa Vogel, a working-class woman from Michigan who had seen female musicians and stage hands demeaned and repeatedly harassed at festivals and venues run by men. MWMF created a feminist alternative and response for lesbians in the music scene and continues to create an annual space for living out lesbian feminist politics. Misogyny is an exaggerated pathological aversion towards women. ... Sexism is discrimination between people based on their Sex rather than their individual merits. ... Homophobia is a term used to describe: A culturally determined phobia manifesting as fear, revulsion, or contempt for homosexuality. ... 1975 was a common year starting on Wednesday (the link is to a full 1975 calendar). ... The term working class is used to denote a social class. ... State nickname: Wolverine State or Great Lakes State Other U.S. States Capital Lansing Largest city Detroit Governor Jennifer Granholm Official languages English Area 250,941 km² (11th)  - Land 147,255 km²  - Water 103,687 km² (41. ... A musician is a person who plays or composes music. ... A lesbian (lowercase L) is a homosexual woman. ...

Of the over 90 women-only festivals in the United States, MWMF is one of two festivals with a womyn-born-womyn policy. Since its inception, MWMF has defined the festival as a separate space for "womyn-born-womyn," i.e. those women who were born and raised as girls and who currently identify as womyn. This controversial policy has gained notoriety for the festival, as it officially denies entry to MtF transsexuals. Supporters of this policy, including MWMF's primary organizers, believe that the particularity of womon-born-womon (WBW) experience (separate and apart from a woman's experience) comes from being born and raised in a female body, and see the festival as a celebration of that experience under the oppression of patriarchy. Supporters of the policy feel that transwomyn have not had the experience of being born and raised female, and thus should not attend the festival. Opponents of the policy, including many transsexual womyn and allies, do not recognize the particularity of WBW experience and argue for a less deterministic understanding of gender, insisting that "womyn's space is for all womyn," regardless of whether one was raised as a male or female. Opponents view the policy as transphobic and have created Camp Trans, an annual protest camp, in response. Womyn is a term used by many radical feminists to take the men out of the word women. ... A transsexual (sometimes transexual) person establishes a permanent identity with the opposite gender to their assigned (usually at birth) sex. ... A patriarch (from Greek: patria means father; arché means rule, beginning, origin) is a male head of an extended family exercising autocratic authority, or, by extension, a member of the ruling class or government of a society controlled by senior men. ... A transsexual (sometimes transexual) person establishes a permanent identity with the opposite gender to their assigned (usually at birth) sex. ... Transphobia (by analogy with homophobia) can entail any of an irrational fear, hatred of, discrimination against, or disapproval and refusal to accept transsexual and transgender people. ... Camp Trans is an annual counter-demonstration outside the Michigan Womyns Music Festival by transsexual womyn and their allies, to protest the Festivals exclusive policy of only allowing womyn-born-womyn to attend. ...