The text of this op-ed was originally given as a speech to Unterweg’s Cafe English in Tübingen, Germany on June 8, 2016. I feel so strongly about the story contained within that I wanted to publish it as an article as well. Hopefully my message can reach a wider audience than just those present for the speech this way!
When I was in elementary school, around 8 or 9 years old, my music class watched "West Side Story" as part of a unit on musical theatre. If you’ve seen "West Side Story," you probably know about the much giggled-at line from Maria’s song “I Feel Pretty” where she sings: “I feel pretty, oh so pretty, oh so pretty and witty and gay!” I still remember my music teacher telling the class that gay, in this context, meant happy or joyful. It did not mean homosexual. The whole class erupted into laughter. This was the first time I remember hearing the word homosexual in my life, and though I had no clue what it meant, I could feel the connotation it held among my peers.
Let me tell another story: I have one younger brother, and he’s always been a bit of a joker. My family was sitting at the table, having dinner one night and for some reason my brother began talking in a high-pitched feminine voice, obviously finding it very funny. My father’s face immediately darkened, and he instantly said, “Stop that, you sound like a homosexual!” My brother went silent and his face turned red, obviously from embarrassment. My mother jumped in, perhaps trying to comfort my brother, saying, “It’s just choice in the world, but it’s a choice we’d prefer you wouldn’t make.” Even after all these years, those exact words are burned in my memory. It’s a choice we’d prefer you wouldn’t make.
These are some of my earliest memories of homosexuality being discussed at my home or at school. As a child, I knew no gay people. I saw none on television or in movies. Gayness was a thoroughly abstract concept, something that I knew existed in the world, but was never part of my immediate surroundings.
I was growing up and going through puberty in this environment, and I later realized that I was not like my peers. To this day, my female friends will jokingly discuss which male characters they had crushes on as small children-- Aladdin, Ash from Pokemon, Prince Eric from The Little Mermaid. I have no memory of crushes like this. Instead, I remember idolizing and being fixated on Disney princesses, Mary Jane from Spiderman, or the Pink Power Ranger.
I can still recall, in middle school, the first time one of my friend exclaimed “that’s so gay!” in response to something stupid happening. Though I couldn’t pinpoint exactly why, I felt deeply unsettled. I face flushed red, and a knot formed in my throat as I tried to say, “hey, you guys really shouldn’t say that.” But I was drowned out by their laughter. I had never in my life heard gayness or gay people discussed in a positive-- or even neutral-- light. At home, my dad was always watching Fox News. He would go on about how “the gays” were infiltrating the education system, becoming teachers and corrupting innocent, impressionable children. He’d talk about gay marriage ruining family values and destroying everything America stood for.
When I was 12 years old, I met my first non-straight person. One of my closest friends came out of the closet as bisexual. This was, for me, a watershed moment. After this friend came out, I began thinking a lot about my sexuality. It was as though there had been a part of me missing for my whole life, and suddenly it was revealed. I consider myself lucky that our generation grew up with, and on, the internet. I was googling all kinds of stuff about bisexuality, and found loads of wonderful resources on the internet, and for a brief moment, I was really happy. I had finally found a word to encompass something that had been a part of me for as long as I can remember. But after that momentary happiness, my next emotion was panic. What do I do now? Do I have to “come out”? What does that mean? Do I have to tell my parents? What will their response be? And so on and so on. Everything was overwhelming, mainly because I had never seen anyone else go through this process, and I felt like I had no one to confide in. I was confused, terrified, and very alone. So I kept this part of me, for the moment, a secret.
Over time, I came out to my friends and they were, of course, wonderful and accepting people. I’ll always be grateful for that. But even at 12 years old, I knew I couldn’t come out to my parents. I was aware of their attitudes towards gay people and gay rights, and I genuinely felt that they would hate me if I told them I wasn’t straight. I feared that they would kick me out of the house or cut me off financially or sent me to some gay-away program like I had read about. And it wasn’t just my family that I was scared of. Even though my immediate friend circle was accepting, not everyone at my school was. People would occasionally confront me with statements like, “Oh, I heard you were bisexual” or “Do you like girls??” and my instant reaction was to backpedal as hard as I could. I’d immediately retreat from these conversations like, “of course I’m straight! Of course! I’m as straight as the next person!” I was absolutely petrified of the judgement of others and this complete and utter terror colored a lot of my adolescence. Even though I was fortunate enough to know a lot of kind and loving people growing up, much of the culture of people my age was still walking around the school hallways saying, “that’s so gay!” or “no homo.” Boys mocked each other by calling each other gay. My brother’s boy scout troop would play a game they called “spear the queer” and no adults present seemed to have a problem with it. Things like this were so pervasive while I was growing up, and even though I didn’t grow up in the deep south or among a particularly religious or intensely conservative environment, homophobia of this nature still ran rampant, and was very much a part of how I saw gay people depicted and heard gay people talked about in my community.
At this point, you’re probably wondering what the point of these stories are. You may be thinking: I know, I know! It’s just another sad gay person story! We get it! And that’s part of the problem. Experiences of any marginalized group tend to get flattened into a single, stereotyped story. The story of being gay in the US tends to go like this: from a young age you realize you feel different from other kids, then you realize you’re gay, maybe through repressed romantic and/or sexual feelings for a same-sex friend, then you hate yourself for a while, then you come out dramatically to everyone in your life at once, and some people are supportive and it is touching and tears are shed, but some people are not and they cut you out of their lives while yelling about how you’re a sinner or a pervert or will never give them grandchildren, then you are depressed, then you try to kill yourself, and finally you reach some dramatic turning point where you learn to completely accept and understand yourself and your sexuality and then you ride off into the sunset with your same-sex partner and adopted children. Certainly there are LGBT+ people who experience parts of this story. Some people maybe experience all of it, exactly in that order. Elements of my story are reflected in the stereotyped story, but other elements aren’t. This story can dominate and drown out other, equally meaningful narratives.
And that’s another reason I’m telling my story. Thankfully, the world has been evolving, views have been shifting, and acceptance for queer individuals has been on the rise. Gay marriage is becoming legalized around the world, adoption rights for same-sex couples are progressing, and more and more people are emboldened to come out and live as their true selves. Children today are more able to see gay people in film and on TV, and acts of violent homophobia are becoming more and more condemned by the mainstream public. The downside of this is that for lots of people (especially straight people), homophobia is an abstract concept. Something they’ve only heard about off in the distance. If straight people aren’t seeing overt, “serious” homophobia, it gets dismissed as something that’s no longer a problem in today’s world. But even if violent acts of outright hatred are decreasing, they still exist and are a painful reality for many gay people, especially gay youth, in the world. Not to mention that microaggressions and other, less overt acts of homophobia still color the experience of young gay people coming out today.
I consider myself lucky. No one has ever directly cut me out of their lives for being bisexual. I’ve never had my life threatened, and never experienced physical violence against me as a result of my sexual orientation. But if being lucky just means I can say, “yeah, no one’s ever assaulted me and my parent’s didn’t kick me out of the house” then we need to do better. We need to make the world a loving space for queer youth, and eliminate all homophobia, regardless of perceived “seriousness” or “importance.” We need to be compassionate, and one way to do so is to diversify our understanding of what it means to be a member of the LGBT community today. LGBT has many meanings and stories and identities behind it. I am just one small voice among many, but I strive to add some kind of new perspective into the myriad of voices out there.
