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LGBTQIA+ Twitter, I want to chat. I keep thinking about how we need, as a community, to be more accepting, affirming, and communicative about "questioning" as an ongoing queer experience. I think we need to be better about accommodating open dialogue regarding experimenting.
Before I say more, I want to throw out that this is something I was thinking about in the shower. It& #39;s half formed and I& #39;m totally ready to misstep so feel free to check me if I do.
I know there are many ppl in the community who say we get too fixated on "labels," which I disagree with. My sexuality is an important part of my identity. Gender is an important part of the trans experience. For some, no label might work. But for others its important.
But to borrow from their philosophy a little bit, I think we get too hung up on expecting people to know the answer. And I think it puts unfair pressure on people in our community to know their answer, when they don& #39;t have one. When "I don& #39;t know right now" IS a valid answer.
I don& #39;t plan to stand around telling us what we do wrong, however. What I do want to do is think about what we could do differently. It feels to me, like it should be more acceptable within to simply say "I think I& #39;d like to try on he/him pronouns for a while" without questions.
Bisexuality is NOT a transitionary label between straight and gay. However, for some people it has been. And that& #39;s okay. Lesbians are not just waiting for the right man to change their mind. But some meet men who make them question.
Before you stop me -- I& #39;m fully aware of the issues this conversation brings up within trying to make our identities palatable to the cis/straight/patriarchal world we live in. If someone told me as a lesbian that one day a man might change my mind, I& #39;d be furious.
I think within our community, I want better tools to embrace the fact that that COULD be someone& #39;s experience. That someone could be bisexual then questioning then gay. That someone could be NB and then a woman. Or a trans guy who wants to return to experimenting with femininity
Maybe the solution to this is to be more communicative about the fact that we might simply not know right now. To erase phrases like "i don& #39;t want to be your experiment" from our dialogue. To stop treating experimentation and exploration with negative backlash.
I identified as straight. And then one day, I came out as bisexual. I identified as bi for years, even dated a man during that time who I still adore. And then I realized I was a lesbian. It took about a YEAR of me trying on lesbian words, saying "gay" now and then just to see.
I started calling myself a lesbian around my friends, I tried split model, I tried on different words, let myself feel different things, and determined that I was, in fact, a lesbian. And now, at nearly 30, I& #39;m rolling through a whole new line of questioning about asexuality.
A few friends know abut that and now and then, I speak candidly as though I have fully embraced my identity as asexual. I have not. I& #39;m not sure that I am ace. But sometimes I want to see what those words feel like. I want to live in them. Talk in them. Feel in them.
I guess what I& #39;m advocating for, as someone who has benefited from having friends around me who give me that wiggle room to figure things out, is that we have a more open dialogue and be more openly receptive as a community to the fact that questioning IS in itself an identity.
"I don& #39;t know right now" is a perfectly acceptable answer to both your sexuality or your gender. We& #39;re inclined to tell people you can& #39;t "try sexuality on like its hat" but why not? Wear the hat, walk around in it, see if it suits you. See if you feel more understood that way.
