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556 posts tagged sexuality
Every summer or Christmas I come home from college to see my family, no one ever asks me about classes, only if I have a boyfriend yet. The summer I got my first girlfriend and was public on facebook about it, all of the questions have stopped about my relationship and the subject is always changed to my degree and my classes and where I’m working.
My last semester, while working on my associates, some of the guys in my psychology class were jeering about how gays were disgusting. I instantaneously felt uncomfortable. When I asked them if their opinion of me would change if I was openly gay, two of the boys just laughed. They said it was impossible, that lesbians had a certain look, that someone ‘like me’ apparently wasn’t able to be gay just because I was polite and had long hair. They said that I couldn’t be anything other than straight as if it was their right to decide. One of them said, 'If she was a lesbian, wouldn’t it be hot, though?’ I dropped the class shortly afterward. To this day, I have never felt more objectified.
I am at the doctor for chronic fatigue and tiredness. My older female doctor listens to all my symptoms and then says, “Well, with young women experiencing fatigue, my first thought is always pregnancy. What type of birth control do you take?”
“None,” I say. “I’m gay.”
“No birth control?” she says, looking alarmed. “Is there any way you could be pregnant?”
“No,’ I say emphatically. "I’ve never had sex with a man. I’m in a monogamous relationship with a woman I’ve been dating for six years.”
“Well…” she frowns at me. “I think we’ll test for pregnancy just in case, with the rest of the bloodwork.”
Why doesn’t she believe me? What is so unbelievable about a young woman never having sex with a man? Why would I lie about that?
My fiancee and I are never acknowledged as a couple, and I think this is because we are both feminine women and different races. Waiters consistently bring us separate checks without asking, shopkeepers at places we are regulars usually eventually ask “so are you two sisters? is that why you are always together?"
We’ll get comments walking down the street like "oh, so sweet to hold your best friend’s hand” or “you girls make me miss my best friend."
When I introduce her to acquaintances or old family friends as my fiancee, they are usually visibly shocked. The frustrating part is that we live in a very liberal city and most of these people consider themselves "cool with gay people” and don’t understand why I get upset.
I hung out with a friend of mine and some men she knew from work. She asked me along because she didn’t know these men very well. The night started off with them discussions how much they wanted to see two lesbians get it on and ended with one of them showing me an unsolicited picture of their penis. Being a homosexual woman, I was on edge from beginning to end and my friend apologized for exposing me to these people.
My English prof told us he didn’t think “derogatory language” directed at LGBTQ students counted as bullying, because it wasn’t physical abuse. His tone when he said it made me want to hide under the desk. It’s like he thinks we should be grateful when it’s ONLY derogatory language, because hey, at least we’re not getting beat up, right? This is the same prof who made a point of telling us singular they/them pronouns were only “technically” correct now because of “an effort to be more inclusive,” and that we should use “he or she” instead whenever possible.
It Girl, a game on Facebook, requires that the players get a virtual boyfriend to get certain bonuses. They don’t realize that some girls don’t fit into this heteronormative mold.
“You don’t _seem_ gay.”
A white classmate when I came out as queer. I’m a queer Asian-American cis woman who “passes” as “not-gay” apparently.
“You’re too pretty to be gay.”
n a high school film class, we watched a student made film with problematic portrayals of disabled people and suicides (including in the credits naming a character who commits suicide “shooter mcgee”) as well as using the word “faggot” lightly and repeatedly. I pointed out what was wrong about the film. She asked the class for counter arguments to what I was saying. Then when I suggested they could have asked these communities for advice, she talked about how political correctness is censorship.
“I mean it’s morally wrong to fire people because they’re gay, but that doesn’t mean that it should be illegal!”
My brother, a straight white man who has never had to fear discrimination in the workplace.
“If you like boys, why don’t you just be a girl?”
A work supervisor to me during a break. I then waste roughly a third of my break trying to explain that gender identity and sexuality are not inherently linked. At the end of my explanations she laughs and says she still doesn’t get it and that she doesn’t really care; leaving me with five minutes left of my break. Because I live in a small town, most of my coworkers have known me since I was a child, and I’ve had to personally ask them to no longer call me by me birth name or use “"she/her”“ pronouns for me. Made me feel exasperated,frustrated,like some quirky game to be accessed at others’ leisure instead of an actual human being.
When I asked for a promotion my colleagues assert that the graduate students are “afraid of me.” This is not reflected in my teaching reviews or conversations with the many great graduate students in the department. It is enough for them to just say this, with no evidence, to deny promotion. They are straight and white. I am not.
A coworker complained to my supervisor after I referred to myself as a dyke (my language of choice for my orientation) in the lunch room. I was told that this is unprofessional language by my supervisor.
I (a lesbian) requested training for my coworkers on working with LGBTQ clients after noticing a number of microaggressions at work. I was told that this was not necessary. A gay male colleague requested the same thing two months later after observing similar events. He was told it would occur eventually but there were more immediate priorities. A straight male colleague requests this and it is immediately organized.