With my two of my characters being openly lesbian/bisexual, and the time fast approaching to write their back stories, I have a few questions for the LGBTQ community out there, because I don't want to write up anything based on stereotypes or assumptions. 1.) How wold were you when you discovered you liked the same sex more than the opposite? 2.) Did it freak you out or did you accept it right away? 3.) Did you worry about your parents (I/E my MC grew up in a very Christian household, so she was always taught the abomination of same sex relations) 4.) Did you ever just try to smash your feelings down and " play it straight" to please your parents/others and hide your sexuality? 5,) (Related to above) Would you ever have married a person of the opposite sex, just to hide your orientation? 6.) How did you "come out" and how did the people around you react? 7.) How does the attraction work? Some people have claimed females are gay by choice for sexual or other reasons. Personally I don't believe this is true, but it's been the source of a debate with one of my friends who claims this: Because my secondary protag was highly abused by her father as a child, and her best friend (female) was always there for her to comfort her, etc.. it's only natural she would start disliking men and prefer women instead.
Some of these are going to have answers as unique as the individuals who are answering. I can speak only for myself. 1.) How wold were you when you discovered you liked the same sex more than the opposite? There was never a sudden moment. There was a slow progression of interest no different than any str8 person as matters of attraction start to become important. Sine it's a thing that's there from the beginning (no matter what others who do not have this life may opine) it just grows along with the putting away of toys and the change to interpersonal interaction. I was maybe 13 when I can remember saying the words in my head, "I'm gay." But in retrospect, my first crush was on Dennis O'Conner in kindergarten. 2.) Did it freak you out or did you accept it right away? It didn't freak me out. I was lucky enough to have grown up in the military and my father's job in the service made for a situation where we were often overseas. I learned early on that there are as many ways of being a Human Being as there are Human Beings being. 3.) Did you worry about your parents (I/E my MC grew up in a very Christian household, so she was always taught the abomination of same sex relations) My family is military and traditional Latinos. Yeah, I worried how it would go down when I talked to them. There were a few months of discomfort, but nothing terrible, nothing tragic. It normalized. 4.) Did you ever just try to smash your feelings down and " play it straight" to please your parents/others and hide your sexuality? Everyone does this in the beginning, at least from my generation. I think young people feel less pressured to play this masquerade these days, and for this I am so grateful. I only did it part way through high-school and then I came out to my friends. I was the only 'out' person in my class. When I went to my class reunion, I was definitely no longer the only person there who was out. 5,) (Related to above) Would you ever have married a person of the opposite sex, just to hide your orientation? Absolutely not. Never mind how miserable it would have made me, the guilt of having made a lie of another person's life is not something I could have lived with. 6.) How did you "come out" and how did the people around you react? I came out first to a girl whom I had briefly dated in high school. After that it was one person here, one person there. Once that seed is planted, you don't have to come out to anyone else. The rumor mill will take care of disseminating the information. Some people were cool with it, others were not. It's high school, everyone is insecure. Lashing out at people who are different is to be expected. 7.) How does the attraction work? Some people have claimed females are gay by choice for sexual or other reasons. Personally I don't believe this is true, but it's been the source of a debate with one of my friends who claims this: Because my secondary protag was highly abused by her father as a child, and her best friend (female) was always there for her to comfort her, etc.. it's only natural she would start disliking men and prefer women instead. It's just there. There is just a connection you feel with people of the same gender that pulls you to them. The majority of people who debate the topic focus on the sex, on what happens between the sheets. So ridiculous. A relationship is not made out of sex. Sex is part of it, but just one facet. Relationships and the attractions that start them, be they gay or str8, are made of so much more. The way a person speaks, the way they enter a room. The way they laugh, the way they think. The things that interest them, the way they interact with others. The care with which they move their hands, the way they look you in the eye when they speak to you. All that and a million other things. This same list of things can be used by the "it's a choice" people to indicate, "Well, you don't mention gender, so all those things can apply to someone of the opposite gender, so you're choosing, Ah-ha!" All I can say is, the two ends of a magnet look identical, but they are not. All the things about girls that flip switches for str8 guys don't flip those switches for me. An attractive, well spoken guys walks in the room, now switches are flipping.
I am not part of the LGBTQ (are they adding new letters every year? what's the Q for?) community, but I have two acquaintances who are, and I suspect I have another who is in the closet. I strongly believe that 4) and 5) happens. I read an article recently where a therapist was quoted saying he's had family fathers come to him, begging him to do something about their sexual orientation because it's messing with their lives so much. Personally, I think that 5) is something really bad. It's not fair on your spouse, your children (if you have them), and eventually all will come out. It would certainly make a good plot device. Re 6), I think I'd be pretty relaxed about it if it's just an acquaintance or friend. Close family members (parents, grandparents, spouse) are another matter, because there's that feeling of personal betrayal to it. Children... hmm... I hope I have at least one who will generate grandchildren for me. ;-)
The "Q" stands for questioning. Anyway, On the topic of #5, that came in because I was going to use that as a plot device. My MC did marry a man for a short time, but she was never happy, etc.. It was a miserable thing, but she kept at it to I guess not only fool her parents, but fool herself as well, because like I said, she grew up in a very religious home, therefore the idea that being gay was not only wrong, it was just plain sinful, was deeply ingrained. I'm wondering if the ending though is a logical trigger for coming out. Basically she gets pregnant, but has miscarriage. At that point the marriage hits the rocks HARD and through that she comes to the point where she figures she can't deny who she is anymore, to heck with her family/religion/etc.. and comes out, gets a divorce, so on...
That's perfectly plausible. The fact that I would never have made the choice to marry a person of the opposite gender does not mean it doesn't happen uncounted times. Of course it happens. I know tons of gay guys my age who have children and ex-wives. Here in Puerto Rico, where social progress regarding this matter is a about a generation back from what it is in the US, it's very, very common.
I have one bi and a lot of gay friends. 'Different answers and unique' is definitely the case. One of the kids in our neighborhood gang was gay. He was always different, we played together a lot and liked the same things, building whole cities in the dirt and furnishing doll house rooms with this designer toy I had. I didn't see much of him in high school but my brother told me some stories about their sexcapades with the girls I won't repeat. (They, as in my brother and 3 other boys that were in the neighborhood group and grew up together through high school.) Years later he was at my sister's wedding and he found a cute way to tell me he was gay. He was holding a woman's purse and he asked me if it looked gay. I don't recall my answer. Then he said, the problem was it didn't match his attire. He was very comfortable in his skin. Sadly the HIV pandemic was about to explode at the same time he moved to San Francisco. A few years later he contracted HIV. I remember his mom and sister calling it "this cancer" and not being able to say it was HIV. They were Catholic. His sister told me about his last moments, how he got a peaceful smile on his face and took his last breath. He made no secret of his homosexuality so the family knew. His sister had also had an abortion, she told me but I don't know if she ever told her family. All that manufactured guilt the religious beliefs can put on people, it's really sad. On a more positive note, my son was involved in the Gay-Straight Alliance in his high school. I had nothing to do with it, I always taught him to stick up for anyone he saw being bullied but I never talked about gay issues per se. One of the boys in his crowd of friends is the bisexual I mentioned. The friend was gay in high school and college. Then one day my son told me the friend had hooked up with one of the girls in the group. I don't know at the moment if he is still with her or not. But I've always been proud of my son for his seeing his gay friend as normal. There are quite a few gay men in our local atheist group. We worked on promoting the gay marriage bill together. I don't know if there are any lesbians in the group but it wouldn't surprise me. For some of them coming out as atheist and gay to religious parents was doubly hard. For some, their families are supportive. It's clearly more difficult if the parents are particularly indoctrinated in some religious beliefs. The gay men who recognize there are no gods can lose the manufactured guilt, but sadly manufactured grief still is a problem for some of their loved ones.
I probably shouldn't inject the matter of gay clergy at the Vatican but as I was doing a lot of reading about Pope Ratzy and the Gay Cabal at the Vatican, I found that more than a few gay men joined the Catholic clergy back in Ratzy's day when gays were much more closeted. Men and women were expected to get married or there was something wrong with them. Joining the clergy was an easy out. It resulted in a fairly large proportion of homosexual priests, some celibate, some practicing. Anyone that wants any material on that let me know. I have a bit of fascinating research.
This is actually very interesting. My time in the military exposed a similar paradigm. It's the last place one would expect to find an inordinate number of LGBTQ folks given the explicit proscription, but once I got past the 'gate-keepers' and the closed-ranks society opened to me, I was gobsmacked. Gobsmacked, I tell you.
I've discussed this to a degree with a lesbian friend of mine, and she's said it's not like women can "turn on" their attraction to women just like that, and you might not find, say, sexual gratification from the same sex even after you've been abused by the opposite. Somehow it's just the way you're born, you don't learn it, and that many people who claim to have "turned gay", actually knew it all along, that they were either bi or gay. But of course that was just what we discussed and only her point of view. It's impossible to speak for everyone, and like Wreybies said, it's not just about sex. Another thing; we're all individuals, and I believe we also fall for an individual, so even a lesbian can have a bunch of male friends instead of "preferring" the company of women over men in their social life, but they still do date women and feel attracted to women. Perhaps you could befriend people in the QUILTBAG community; just don't barge to their safe places with a bunch of questions or you might be treated coldly. Don't go there just for the sake of doing research for a novel. Just go hang out with people, join some organization and go to their parties, yeah, even straight people can go. Beware straight white women; they don't like it if you use a lesbian and an assassin in the same sentence because that's offensive. That was a joke. Well, it really happened and made my said gay friend laugh her ass off, but seriously, you gotta tread respectfully, especially if you are the most privileged creature of them all: a straight, white male. Read books, e.g. Orange Are Not the Only Fruit and Passion by Jeanette Winterson, pretty much anyhing by Sarah Waters. You'll also find answers and insight from literature.
I'd recommend this book - I've read it, it's excellent. It's written by a gay Christian, also the founder of the Gay Christian Network. It's his personal story coming from a Southern Baptist background, and still a devoted Christian today (of course, considering he founded GCN) and he details how he felt when he finally realised he was gay, the process of denial, the attempt at "curing" himself, coming out to his Christian parents, the reaction of the general Christian community towards him, and finally, how he came to believe that gay sex is not a sin according to the Bible after much prayer and study. The book is predominantly a personal story of how he coped, but the goal of the book is more geared towards the church and creating harmony between the LGBT community and the Christian community. You can ignore that part if it's not relevant, but his story will probably help you. He basically answers all your questions in his book. Here you go. It links to the British amazon. If you're in the US, the title is different - it's called Torn in America. http://amzn.to/13WXaAO And here's the archive to that author's blog - it often tackles questions straight Christians have about the LGBT community - http://gcnjustin.tumblr.com/archive One of the blog post is actually entitled: "Isn't calling yourself a gay Christian like saying you're an adulterous Christian?" It's rather revealing that people actually ask that. But not all Christians are hostile - some are simply ignorant, others haven't truly considered the POV from a gay person's, and more and more people in their 20s and below are wholly supportive of gay marriage, for example. And then you get fundies who say that you should gag when you hear of gay marriage, and of course, John Piper who says gay marriage doesn't exist, so when a gay couple comes to repent, you can share the good news with them that they needn't get a divorce because, hey, you were never married no matter what the state says! Not that Piper is a fundie - he's a Calvinist. I do despair when I think about this stuff. Well anyway, I guess now you have an idea of how the Christian households might react around your openly gay characters. But again, even amongst Christians, the opinion is split. It all depends on how conservative your characters are.
I knew there were more letters. I don't want to take this thread off topic, but I wanted to raise one point. A few acquaintances and friends of mine have opined that everybody is bisexual to some degree (and have consequently tried to convince me that I am also bisexual, following their logic). I disagree with that view, since I am pretty sure of my inclination (which happens to be heterosexuality - I am a man and love and married a woman). My said acquaintances keep trying to convince me I am hiding something, but I am quite convinced I am not. Surely it is possible to be focused on (only) one sex?! Could also be a plot device, to keep this post moderately helpful to the OP. Also very interesting. I once witnessed a navy officer casually talking about his participation in gay sex on navy ships to a mostly army/air force group (everybody was already slightly drunk, but not seriously). Half the group was amused, the other half shocked. I was in the amused section. I think at least half our amusement came from the shock on the other half's faces.
I've known from earliest childhood - literally as long as I can remember. I didn't know the words for it, but I knew I was attracted to guys, and that the attraction was sexual. This was when I was four or even younger. It didn't freak me out at the time; it was very natural to me. I always had the vague idea, though, that others wouldn't approve. I think this is because I never saw any male-male couples expressing any overt affection in public - no kissing, no hand-holding, nothing. I never saw two men treating each other the way heterosexual couples do. There was no reinforcement for my sexuality, no affirmation, so I gradually gathered that it was frowned upon by society. As I grew older, I became terrified that my parents would find out. My teen years were practically wrecked by that fear. Yes. I remember, in my late teens, I'd go so far as to buy Playboy magazines and others of that kind and leave them sort of hidden, but not very well hidden, in my bedroom, hoping my mother would find them and be reassured that I was normal. That's kind of funny when I think about it now, but it was very serious then. Never, ever. Not in a million years. I know there are others who do that, but that always struck me as a horribly selfish thing to do. I would have to maintain a lie to a woman; I would never be the husband she would want and that she deserved. I'd be denying her the kind of life she deserved just so I could use her as part of my disguise, and I could never bring myself to treat anybody else that way. My mom came right out and asked me when I was in my mid-thirties. I told her. She was totally cool with it. (My mother and I were both living on the British Columbia coast at the time; the rest of my family were in Toronto.) She told my sister, and my sister called me to talk about it. She was cool about it, too, and wanted to know who, of all my family and friends in Toronto, she could tell. I said she could tell anyone she liked. She told my dad. He was the one I was most worried about, of course. The next time I saw my dad, he told me he wished I'd told him earlier - much earlier. He asked, "Did you think I was a barbarian?" I was supremely grateful that he was cool with it, but I also felt crushed, because for all those years I'd been hurting him by not trusting him. That was a pretty devastating moment, and I still think about it a lot. I don't know how it "works." All I know is that there is no choice involved - zero. There was never a time I could ever have been any other way. The one point I'd like to make here is that sexuality affects every other part of a person's life. I grew up in Toronto, but I was in the closet, and as I got to the age where everyone else I knew were getting girlfriends and even getting married, I felt like I was sticking out like a sore thumb more and more. I became horribly depressed, and I had to get out of there. I moved to Victoria, BC mostly because I couldn't tolerate being in Toronto any more. If I'd been straight, it would have been no problem. But it was a problem, so I had to go somewhere where nobody knew me. Then I got online (1995ish) and met the guy who is now my roommate. He and I are sexually compatible, and by coincidence, we're both electronics engineers. He invited me to come to California to live with him and be his partner in his business. I did so, and that's why I'm in SoCal. If I'd been straight, I'd still be in Toronto and I'd never have gotten involved in designing and building control systems for the entertainment industry. At the age of 52, I am where I am, doing what I'm doing, because of the way my sexuality was programmed into me at conception. Being gay has affected every aspect of my life.
I don't understand the mystery. Most (all?) of us are sexually attracted to some people and not to all people. Either you are attracted to the same gender, the opposite or both. You know it when it happens. That period of infatuation is exciting and fun. You can't make it happen, it's not something you choose to feel. Some people have sex purely for lust. I have, but not with someone I wasn't also physically attracted to. Paying a prostitute certainly fits that category. I can't imagine trying sex with another woman just because I was horny, it doesn't appeal to me. But I can imagine some heterosexual women might try it. It wouldn't change their sexual orientation so the idea all of us are bi simply isn't supported by the evidence.
That's not a bad idea. I'm actually not too far from the Castro (maybe 100mi or so) which is probably the best place in NorCal to find what I'm looking for. Also, there are a couple of openly gay organizations up in the next town that might be worth a look. Anyway, as it stands with my MC's story: She was raised in a Christian home with a mother that falls into the category of what I like to call a "religious terrorist." Prayer was manditory as was reading the Bible nightly and the idea was deeply ingrained in her that being gay in any form was a sin worthy of the lowest levels of Hell. However, she never felt right, even from a small child. She always noticed that liked girls more than boys, but to her, this was HIGHLY concerning given her background. As a result she tried to shake it off and maybe in some ways fool herself into thinking she was straight by dating men/sleeping with men/etc... This went on for years, even to the point where at the age of 24 she married a man she met in the military. They were together for two years (with the MC miserable, depressed, feeling sex was a chore, and so on) until she became pregnant, then subsequently lost the baby. After that the marriage hit the rocks hard. She blamed herself for loosing the baby and both took to the bottle out of depression. As time went on things got progressively worse and eventually the MC came to the point where she came to the conclusion she couldn't live this lie anymore. She had to accept who she was and finally came out to her husband, then filed for divorce (which was a nasty affair.) Then the rest of her life continues where she's basically living and going through the stories as an open lesbian. Does that sound like a plausible plot, or something that would interest you to see how it all unfolds?
I know it's not the same, but when I was something like 13, my brother (11 years older than me) asked, in all seriousness, if I was lesbian. He actually sat me down and asked it. That effed up my teen brain well and good for a while. After that I ended up overcompensating, wallpapering my room with posters of guys (which made my mom real happy... not), I was ashamed I listened to t.A.T.u -- I liked their music -- and I was embarrassed to be one of those nerdy girls who just go to the horse stables and have female friends. The irony? I was back then and still am straight. To me that sounds plausible. I think I'd be more interested to read about her life after she's come out, but that's just me.
Alesia - your storyline is very plausible, judging from the things I've read and heard. I still remember reading one of the comments on the GCN about coming out, and the user said how she's married and in her 50s or 60s and still as gay as she was when she was a teen, and miserable. I also know my ex's best friend was gay and went to a boarding school, where he was in an all-boys' house, so he'd overcompensate and plaster his bedroom with playboy and naked girls. My ex says now he wishes he knew, because it must have been hard being so isolated. Seriously, read that book I recommended. If your character's a "religious terrorist", I'd categorise that as Christian Fundamentalist - just google it. It's much worse than you can imagine. Currently I'm part of a Facebook group and the group creator is a teenage girl who loves writing and fantasy books - she's since been forbidden to even see her friends in a cafe and being watched at all times even in her own house and her laptop's been confiscated so she can't go online and can't secretly read fantasy books. Happening right now. And that's just fantasy stuff - that's not even talking about the "ultimate abomination" of homosexuality. (note that I do not believe it's an abomination - it's just what some people say it is sometimes) Personally, I echo what someone else said earlier - I'd be more interested in her life AFTER she came out. Does she still believe in God? How has she reacted to church and Christians generally? Again there are many gay Christians who've either found their balance or else found a church who openly accepts gay people, but there's an equal number who've completely fallen out with the church and has since either 1. left the faith or 2. still believing but no longer goes to church regularly, if at all. I'd encourage you to visit gay Christian blogs and networks if you're really interested in how an open lesbian might be like coming from a conservative Christian background. And I don't mean read only the blog posts - the most revealing things are actually said in the comments. That's where numerous people share their stories, voice their disagreements, past hurts, and where you find believers and non-believers alike from all walks of life. There're as many reactions as there are human beings, but it's one of those massive struggles that you cannot avoid writing if you wanna keep it realistic.
I saw a video once, that I am pretty sure is on You Tube, where someone did those "on the street" interviews. They asked people, "When did you first realize you were heterosexual?" Most people were momentarily stunned, and then smiled or laughed, when they realized they couldn't really pinpoint a specific moment, but that it was just something they'd known for a long time. I think that video pretty much sums up the validity of asking that question to homosexual people. Also, most people, whether they are hetero or homosexual, aren't attracted to every single person they meet who is of a particular gender. Sometimes we can't even pinpoint exactly what it is we find attractive. And, for me, anyway, I can think someone is physically attractive, but then they open their mouth and any attraction drops to near zero. So there are a lot of components that go into what we find attractive in other people.
People have different tastes. I think we'd be in trouble if we were attracted to every single person out there... And we aren't always attracted to just looks. Say, someone's a charismatic orator but looks like a vulture's ass -- you might still fancy him/her. I think that's the thing with some males -- especially of the older generation -- getting super uncomfortable when they know they're showering with a gay guy at the gym/swimming hall etc. Like, what are the chances that guy actually finds your balding crown and hairy pot belly sexy? Or just because he's gay, he must be thinking about you that way?
Actually, in the story itself, she's very open and out about it. All that information I gave is background I plan to throw in over the course of the narrative. As far as religion is concerned: That's a tough one. I wouldn't go so far as to say she hates religion, but she herself is definitely NOT religious. I'm thinking the term jaded might fit best as far as her views on religion go. That's another plot device I was thinking of using eventually too, you know, that coming full circle and finally figuring out how to balance religion with her lifestyle, because something like religion - especially as deeply ingrained in her as it was - doesn't just go away because you claim to be an atheist.
Just as a side note to that last bit, there is no reason she can't keep her faith and accept herself as she is, her life as it is, and take into her heart that this is the life she was given to live, thus acceptable, even rejoic-eable in the eyes of her deity. The idea that being gay is sinful, wrong, blah, blah, blah is not a precept supported by all christians. I find myself often defending progressive christians when people in my own community lump them in with fuel injected fundies like Pat Robertson. I mention this only as an option if you find you want to go that way.
Shouldn't be too hard: the fundamentalists trying to make her life miserable, believing morality to be about obedience rather than righteousness, are the same people Jesus had the biggest problem with. If she's a Christian, then I imagine that Matthew 18: 21-35 might help her keep hetero-supremacist rhetoric in perspective: people who laugh at others and insist that "God hates you as much as I do and will damn you to eternal Hellfire for disobeying me," are the ones who are actually going to Hell.
Ugh, don't even get me started on Robertson. After I read his latest rhetoric... this is neither the time nor the place.
Trust me, I agree an all points. This is not the place to argue his heinous rhetoric, but, my point is, she could very easily meet others along the way who show her that viewpoints like his are only just that, viewpoints. The fact that he and others like him say a thing doesn't make that thing real. There are uncounted churches across the land that are accepting and teach real love, inclusive love, not exclusive love, and she could easily learn that the church is not the baddie, it's just been twisted a bit by some, but not by all. She doesn't have to lose her love of god to gain a love of herself. Again, just throwing out options.
Like I said, she's pretty jaded on religion right now, but all hope is not lost. Lets just say I think she might find what she's looking for in her partner and the Buddha...
