LGBTQ Voices
How I Coped With My Identity Being Hypersexualized
I’ve come out to pretty much all my close friends and I have many friends who I’m not close with who are LGBTQ+ and who I will casually say that I like girls around because I feel comfortable. It’s not really coming out, but I feel more like I’m able to be myself around other LGBTQ+ people. I’ve only really come out to other LGBTQ+ people and it’s made them more comfortable around me.
There have been times when I have told male friends, who I’m not friends with anymore, that I’m bi and they’ll respond with saying, “So you’re into threesomes, right?” It was always a very sexualized response, which I don’t like, so I stopped telling straight people about my sexuality.
I haven’t come out to my parents yet, but I think they will accept me. I’m waiting until my sister comes out, so I can come out in support of her.
I’ve had crushes on girls since middle school, but I wouldn’t see them as crushes because it didn’t feel normal, even though it was the same feeling that I had towards guys.
There was this girl in my class who would always call me cute and smile at me and I would always blush around her. I really did like her, but I didn’t accept it, I just thought, “Maybe I just want to be her friend because she’s a girl.”
I always liked girls. When I was 12 years old, I asked my friends if it was normal to be straight and attracted to girls and they said that it wasn’t normal.
I kind of buried it inside me all of high school. I knew I liked girls, but I felt very alone because all my friends identified as straight.
There’s no way to really measure if homophobia has gotten better or worse but it’s an issue that’s being talked about more. There are still homophobic things being done. For example, wedding cakes not being baked for gay couples.
I wouldn’t say media representation is very varied. A lot of gay movies, but not enough trans representation, especially trans women representation. Hopefully, the future holds more acceptance to the LGBTQ+ community.