Invisible identities
Or, why I come out all the time, incessantly, to everyone.
This spring, I went to a library workshop where we were asked to make identity maps. One of my major takeaways from the exercise was that some of the most important things that inform our notions of self are often invisible. For me, as a cis-appearing, white, mostly-abled person in a cross-gender relationship, in a body that is still with the socially acceptable bounds of fat, I get treated as "normal" a lot, which means I am usually only blatantly discriminated against for being AFAB. Nothing outweighs the privilege that I have from being white. And living without the threat of violence above what allocishet abled white women experience is an extraordinary privilege. And. There are parts of my identity that I am pressured to erase or pretend don't exist for other people's comfort, and that's feels gross, and like a smaller violence.
But it's also a conversation I've had with the people in my life who love me the most, because there is a lot for other people to unpack about their reactions to queer folks. So, if you're a straight person who's ever asked a bi person, "why do you keep coming out," OR you're a bi person who keeps answering this big, complicated question.... I don't know if this post will help, but maybe? In the former case, stop asking that question tho plz thx.
What is a core part of my identity that matters profoundly to how I know myself? I'm a recovering anorexic, a trauma survivor, a lifelong (so far) member of Al-Anon, a person with anxiety, a bigender femme person, a questioning Deist. I'm bisexual. I'm queer.
I don't talk about my ED or my alcoholic parents much because those are private things and also anonymous programs. I don't talk about my trauma much because it's even more private. My anxiety is evident to literally anyone who has ever interacted with me. My gender changes by the minute so I don't know what to tell you about it. God and I are between us.
Here's what's different about being queer, and I'm only the hundred thousandth person to say this: romance is all around us all the time. It's not just that it's normal to be queer, because it's also normal to be fat and have anxiety and am eating disorder. But it's not socially acceptable to *talk* about your eating disorder (that's another post, and one I've been writing for months). It IS social acceptable for y'all to tell me at length about your Pantsfeelings for Channing Tatum, who looks like someone genetically engineered a potato to be both extremely amiable and an excellent dancer.
Other people get married and still talk about how beautiful Lenny Kravitz is. I got married and heard, "maybe you can stop telling everyone you're gay now."
Well, no, I have to tell them MORE now because otherwise HOW WILL THEY KNOW?
You may wonder why they need to know. Well, first, I've fallen in love with some women in my life, and in the course of getting to know people, one talks about one's past. I don't think I should need to play the pronoun game, since falling in love with women is NORMAL. Second, as it turns out, the world is kind of shitty to queer people, and it's important for me both to signal to my kin and to let those coming up behind me see out queer people living diverse experiences and happy lives. Third, I get to be an ambassador to the straight world! I'm like, undercover! They know me and like me and then KAZAM I fooled you I am A GAY.
Fourth, and I think this is quite important really, I didn't stop BEING queer so why should I stop TALKING about it?
I have some theories, that are theories that feminists and queer theorists already had, but hey. I think there are a few reasons that it's really, really awkward when bisexuals who are in cross-gender relationships come out.
1) it threatens heteronormativity, which makes everyone uncomfortable.
2) it undermines the narrative that lesbians just need a good deep dicking, in other words, if a woman is having sex with a man and is still attracted to women, it's seen as emasculating and threatens the general idea of male sexual prowess. I legit think a lot of dudes, and straight women, think that sapphic women are with other women because of the absence of a suitable man, or because they're in romantic love so have sex, but do not necessarily feel desire in the way that heterosexual couples do. There are certainly people who are bi- or homo- romantic but asexual or not attracted sexually to that gender. I don't want to erase them. But i do think there's a long history of wlw relationships being desexualized as "just intimate friends"/ gals being pals and y'all.... There are hormones. There are pheromones. There is lust. There are PANTSFEELINGS.
3) Unlike gay or Lesbian, bisexual has the word sex in it, which (how does this coexist with the above point? Somehow it does) makes all bisexual feelings lurid instead of like hey I am attracted to people of two or more genders. So like, telling people you're a bisexual is somehow talking about sex. And I know I just talked about lust, but Bros, I'm generally just talking about the thing that our society talks about ad infinitum, which is falling in lurve.
4) the incorrect belief that only women are bi means that people dismiss bisexuals because silly women don't know how they feel! #thepatriarchy
Here is a thing that you have probably felt if you are a part of a generally invisible minority: when I am in a room of other sapphic women, I feel like I am able to take off a mask that I wear, against my wishes, all the time. I feel like I have taken my bra off at the end of the day. I am amongst people who *know.* i don't think straight people ever think of being straight as a big part of their identity, but I suspect they have other things they feel this way about. Why is being bi a big part of my identity, even if I'm in a "straight" relationship (I'm not, those have 2 straight people in them)? Umm being gay is kind of a big deal? In America today? Also who I love romantically is made a pretty big deal of? Also who is anyone to tell me my SEXUAL IDENTITY should become a moot point?
When I come out to a straight person, I may be making a political statement, I may be asserting that my lived experience has value and shouldn't be hidden to make other people feel more comfortable, I may be signaling, but also.... I may just be saying " I like you and I'd like to know that I don't have to wear this particular mask around you."
My friend Elizabeth has been on a quest to lift weights in order to take up more physical space in the world. I am coming out, all the time, to everyone, as a way of planting a flag in the social dirt that says, NOT EVERYTHING IS YOURS, DUDES, or, WE'RE HERE WE'RE QUEER YOU CAN'T ESCAPE US or just I Love Women and That Feels Lonely and It Shouldn't.
I come out because I didn't really know bi was an option until I was like, 14, which meant my sexual awakening was confusing, and I want kids to know they can get twitterpated over just any old gender that gives them butterflies.
I come out because married moms get our individual identities erased and I want to remember that I am a whole separate human.
I come out because have you met me? I tell everyone everything all the time forever.
I come out because people who are embarrassed by my sexual identity can process that without making it my responsibility.