Category Archives: Gender and Sexuality

Gender and Sexuality

Um, Seriously?

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Have you heard about Lulu?  I hadn’t either until Diane Duane reblogged a link to an article about it on her Tumblr.  Lulu is an app for women to offer their opinions and share their experiences with the men in their lives, most notably the men they’ve dated.  The article makes it sound like the app’s aiming to become a giant database of references that women can look at when considering whether to get involved with or even go on a first date with a guy.

I don’t think that’s necessarily a bad thing1.  What I do think is problematic, however, is how Alexandra Chong, Lulu’s CEO and founder, is pitching it:

My vision has always been to create a discreet, private space for girls to talk about the most important issues in their lives: their relationships.

Um, what?  Is Alexandra Chong really suggesting that for every single woman out there, the most important thing in her life is her relationships?  As opposed to her education?  Her schooling?  Her family?  Her dreams of being the next CEO of her own company?  Any health issues she might have?  I’m having a hard time believing it.  I think women are much more individually complicated and collectively diverse than that.

I’m also troubled by the suggestion because, let’s face it, we already have plenty of sexist people — especially sexist men — who think that a woman’s worth and importance is primarily and even solely defined by the men she is related to, whether it be romantically, biologically, or even just platonically.  So pitching any sort of relationship app in a way that reinforces that notion and suggests that women should see themselves in that same light strikes me as troubling.

On a semi-related note, I’m a bit weirded out by “Dear Dude,” which is apparently Lulu’s advice column on relationships and sex.  Seriously?  You create an app that’s strictly for women to share about their relationships and you think a guy — a “Dude,” no less — is the best person to offer your all-female userbase relationship advice?  Is this more “Mars/Venus” bullshit?  Because that’s the vibe I’m getting.

Gender and Sexuality

Starting to Review the Pew Research Center’s Survey of LGBT People

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On Thursday the Pew Research Center released their findings from a survey of 1,197 LGBT people.  I’m currently looking over it, as it’s not exactly a short document.  However, I wanted to share a few points from he summary and my observations.  One of the opening statements in the release has to do with how LGBT feels about societal acceptance:

An overwhelming share of America’s lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender adults (92%) say society has become more accepting of them in the past decade and an equal number expect it to grow even more accepting in the decade ahead. They attribute the changes to a variety of factors, from people knowing and interacting with someone who is LGBT, to advocacy on their behalf by high-profile public figures, to LGBT adults raising families.

At the same time, however, a new nationally representative survey of 1,197 LGBT adults offers testimony to the many ways they feel they have been stigmatized by society. About four-in-ten (39%) say that at some point in their lives they were rejected by a family member or close friend because of their sexual orientation or gender identity; 30% say they have been physically attacked or threatened; 29% say they have been made to feel unwelcome in a place of worship; and 21% say they have been treated unfairly by an employer. About six-in-ten (58%) say they’ve been the target of slurs or jokes.

While the text of the summary does not include this information, the graphs accompanying it break down the percentage of LGBT respondents who reported facing each form of bigotry in the last year:

  • Been subjected to slurs or jokes:  16
  • Been rejected by a friend or family member: 6
  • Been threatened or physically attacked: 4
  • Been made to feel unwelcome in a place of worship: 6
  • Received poor service in a restaurant, hotel, or place of business: 5
  • Been treated unfairly by an employer:  5

I think some of these figures are quite telling when compared to the percentage of LGBT people who have experienced these things ever in their life.  For example, of the 21% of all LGBT people who reported being treated by an employer, nearly one fourth of them say that this happened in the last year.  I’m curious how the experiences of the other 16% would map out on a timeline.

I also think that this underscores why ENDA and hate crimes legislation that protect LGBT people are so important.  People who claim that violence and discrimination against LGBT people are a thing of the past need to be directed to surveys like this.

Speaking of legal protections, I found the commentary regarding marriage equality and other LGBT issues worth noting:

Despite nearly universal support for same-sex marriage among LGBT adults, a significant minority of that population—39%—say that the issue has drawn too much attention away from other issues that are important to people who are LGBT. However, 58% say it should be the top priority even if it takes attention away from other issues.

Personally, I’d like to see that significant minority to gain more traction.  The other issues mentioned in that paragraph — as well as healthcare coverage for trans* people, which are mentioned later — are of great importance as well.  And I tend to think that some of them are things that many who are in charge (and I’m thinking of myself and my fellow cis white gay men who are financially secure) tend not to have to worry about and/or can take for granted.

I’ll hopefully have more to say as I digest the rest of the findings over the next few days.

Gender and Sexuality

The shocking discovery that women are sexual beings too

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[Content Note:  Sexism, Rape Culture, Objectification of Women]

Don't tell him that some women hit on guys. I fear his head may explode!
Don’t tell him that some women hit on guys. I fear his head may explode!

I didn’t get a chance to write a blog post for today as i was having too much fun celebrating my birthday yesterday.  However, I wanted to spotlight Libby Anne’s post from today.  In it, she discusses a preacher who is pro- modesty movement and who recently wrote an article in the Christian Post in which he discovers that (heterosexual and bisexual) women experience sexual desire when they see men.  I love and fully agree with Libby Anne’s response to this discovery:

He had never considered it.He had never considered it. Twenty years of ministry, twenty years of preaching modest, and he’d never thought about the fact that women are also sexual beings. This alone is illustrative of a huge blind spot in the circles that preach modest, if you ask me.

Of course, experience tells me that this isn’t just a problem with people in the modesty movement.  The idea that women are sexual beings seems to escape the notice of a lot of people, especially a lot of men.  There are too many narratives about men being the sex-seekers and women being the gatekeepers of sex.  Those narratives also tend to ignore the idea that women might actually want and seek out sex rather than try to prevent it.  In many ways, the erasure of women as sexual beings with sexual desire is a key component of treating women as sex objects and the proliferation of rape culture1.

So I’m not entirely surprised that this minister missed the memo that women have pantsfeelings too.  After all, we live in a society that too often ignores a lot of things about women, including the fact that they are fully human and therefore sexual as well.  And it contributes to a lot of problems.

At any rate, be sure to go read the rest of Libby Anne’s post if you haven’t yet.  It’s great.

1As an aside, Libby Anne’s blog is a great resource for exploring how both the modesty and purity movements influence and reinforce the objectification of women and rape culture as well, despite the fact that their stated intent is to uphold the value of women.

Gender and Sexuality

Sharing Shane and Tom’s story

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[Content Note:  Anti-gay Discrimination, Anti-gay Violence, Death, Loss of a Loved One]

I know I said I was going to be doing light and easy posts until after my birthday.  However, a friend on Facebook posted the following video yesterday and I feel it’s important enough to share here, my plans be damned.

[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pR9gyloyOjM]

Tom and Shane’s story is heartbreaking and not uncommon.  It’s what happens when people whose relationships are not honored by their family are given no form of legal recognition and therefore no protections.  A surviving partner can be left out in the cold.  This is the reality that many “defenders of traditional marriage” want to ignore and sweep under the rug.  Oh, when confronted, they’ll pay lip service to wanting to find “other ways” of protecting same-sex couples and LGBT people in general.  But I have yet to see them put actions behind their words.  And words without actions to back them up are little more than lies to me.

I’m also deeply disturbed by the behavior of Tom’s family.  I mean, this is their son’s lover they’ve shut out completely.  As Shane himself suggested, he was (almost certainly) the most important person in Tom’s life.  How Tom’s family can do something that I find so incredibly disrespectful toward and dishonoring of their own son’s memory astounds me.  This is why I say that people in my life do not have to like or approve of my love relationships.  However, they have to accept that they are what they are and deal with that reality.

According to the EqualLoveEqualRights Facebook page, there’s a documentary about Tom and Shane’s story which was shown this past April at the Tribeca Film Festival.  I look forward to checking it out when it becomes available on DVD.

Gender and Sexuality

More musings on choosing friends.

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[Content Note:  Homophobia, problematic and difficult friendships.]

Just my sense of humor, too.
Just my sense of humor, too.

I have to admit that Sunday’s post about ending friendships was not a topic I chose out of thin air.  It was primarily inspired by the day last week when I was looking through my blog visitor statistics and discovered that someone had found my blog through the search phrase “being gay and having a homophobic friend.”  My immediate reaction to reading that was to think of the old adage:  With friends like that, who needs enemies?

Rather then immediately responding to that query and the subject of dealing with homophobic friends, I decided to write Sunday’s post and talk about the liberation I found when I realized I’m allowed to choose my friends and even terminate current friendships if I feel it’s the best choice for my life.  After all, when dealing with a friend who is homophobic and making my life miserable because of hir homophobia, having the option to walk away altogether is a powerful thing.  Whether a person is virulently homophobic by spouting hateful slurs or merely inundating me with subtle microagressions like meeting every mention of my love life with cold and disapproving silence, that thing can get wearisome.  And it’s good to know that I don’t have to put up with it for the sake of some idealistic notion about “friendship” and “friends are forever1.”

Mind you, that doesn’t  mean that I can or should immediately kick every person out of my life.  Sometimes, there really are things about the friendship that make it worth sticking it out.  (But I get to decide whether that’s really the case.)  Sometimes, other factors require me to keep that person in my life.  Perhaps a given “friend” is really a relative that I simply will not be able to avoid or cut off all communication with without making family functions horribly awkward.  Maybe we’re on the same sporting team or  involved in the same project and I’m unwilling to give that up in order to avoid them2.  There are other reasons as well.

But knowing that I ultimately have the option to terminate a friendship with someone who cannot accept me for who I am — even if I decide that option is not a good choice in a particular situation — allows me to think of my many options of how to deal with such a person.

1As an aside, while searching for a graphic to include in Sunday’s post, I was disturbed by the sheer volume of images that promoted this “friendship is forever/never let go of a friend if you’re a real friend” thinking.

2I will note, however, that in such a scenario, I still have the power to limit my interactions with that person.  I may have to be cordial at team or group functions, but I don’t have to go beyond that.  Nor do I have to pretend we’re bosom buddies.  This is where it’s helpful to keep in mind that there are not just friends, but also acquaintances.

Around The Blogosphere, Gender and Sexuality, Religion

An interesting article about a retreat for LGBT Muslims

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As a white, middle class gay man from a Christian background1, it’s easy to forget what other LGBT people who face further problems due to other bases for marginalization they may face.  It was with this in mind that I read a Washington Post article about the experiences of people attending a Pennsylvania retreat for LGBT Muslims.

The article brought home the whole concept of intersectionality and why it’s important when they quoted one attended:

“On the one hand, I was bullied at school for being a Muslim,” said Alam. “On the other, I was worried my parents and other Muslims wouldn’t accept me for being gay.”

When there are multiple prejudice-based reasons for people to hate or mistreat you, the number of people who will accept you for all of who you are shrinks even more.  That’s something that’s easy to forget for some of us.  (We mustn’t forget, no matter how easy it is.)

Of course, it’s also easy for many of us who have fought with the dominant religious culture in our society — Christianity — over our worth as human beings who happen to be part of a sexual minority to forget that there are those LGBT people among us who are having those same exact fights within their own minority religions.  How well do we support them in that fight, I wonder.  (Not very well, I suspect.)

I highly encourage everyone to go read the Post article.  It gives a brief description of what the retreat meant to and has done for a handful of those who attended.  I really have nothing else to say, other than, “Listen to them.”

(Related:  I also highly recommend watching A Jihad for Love, a documentary about the lives and struggles of LGBT Muslims worldwide.)

1While it’s true that I’m now part of a religious minority, I think that the fact that I started life and spend over two decades as a part of the mainstream family of religions her in the U.S. still grants me a certain amount of privilege.

Gender and Sexuality, Religion

Spotlighting a Couple of BTG Posts

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I really don’t have much to say today.  This is fine because it gives me the chance to point out a couple of posts written by Wendy over at the Bridging the Gap blog.  The first post is where she gives a brief summary and a few thoughtst about about the GSCR.  As I’ve blogged a bit about my own experiences at the retreat, I thought some readers might be able to hear someone else’s thoughts.  I particularly liked the sampling of quotes Wendy included from various attendees toward the bottom of her post.

The other post I want to draw readers’ attention to is one in which Wendy talks about a video showing a discussion between Rob Bell and Andrew Wilson in which the topic of the morality of same sex sexual relationships comes up.  Wendy offers her thoughts on how she might have responded to Wilson’s comments and questions, had she been in Bell’s position.  Her detailed and thoughtful analysis of some of the underlying questions — questions that don’t always have to do with human sexuality no less — that must be answered, as their answers will greatly influence how someone approaches the whole topic.

Wendy, being who she is, ties it back to Generous Spaciousness:

My point is not to argue for Rob Bell’s position. My point is that there are robust theological reflections that help us to understand why we can come to such different perspectives on matters such as our theology and ethics of sexuality. My point is to try to demonstrate that generous spaciousness is not some weak, compromise that is simply motivated by keeping up with culture and trying to make God relevant in a gay-positive context. Rather, generous spaciousness costs us our pride, it costs us the luxury of arrogant certainty. Generous spaciousness costs us our security in our exegesis, our hermeneutics, our interpretations. (especially when such exegesis and hermeneutics result in prohibitions for others that do not personally affect ourselves) Generous spaciousness forces us to find our security in the wild, untamable revealing of Jesus Christ to us through the Holy Spirit, through the Scriptures, through tradition (including contemporary tradition), through the academic disciplines, and through our experiences. And the truth is that this revelation is not in our control – it is in God’s control. This demands our humility, our openness, our fearlessness, our willing to risk following – even when it seems God is doing a new thing.

I absolutely love it when Wendy — or anyone else — talks about humility and then goes on to practice it.  I find her willingness to let go of determining what is right for someone else’s life and leave that in God’s hands refreshing and powerful.  I also think it takes no small amount of faith, personally.

If you haven’t done so already, go read Wendy’s posts.  The whole blog, if you have the time.

Gender and Sexuality, Health

Sometimes, you just need someone to talk to

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Listening SkillsOne of the things I enjoy doing with this blog is looking over the site statistics and paying particular attention to what search phrases people use that land them on my blog.  Some of them can be downright amusing.  Others can be rather thought-provoking.  Still others manage to be both of those things at the same time.  Then on rare occasion, I run across a search phrase like this one from a few days ago:

i get a funny feeling around my friends gay

Now maybe I’m completely misreading this, but I picture a teenager (or maybe someone a bit younger) sitting at the computer after having realizing that have “funny feelings” (and I won’t try to guess what those feelings actually are) around their friends who happen to be the same sex as them and trying to understand what this means.  I imagine they’re experiencing a sense of confusion and maybe fear.

If my imagination has any resemblance to reality, I sincerely hope that this young person has someone they feel they can trust enough to talk to, and that said person will listen to them.  I know I would have loved to have someone to talk to back then.  Someone who would have just listened to me without passing judgement or telling me what I should do.  Someone would have have just listened without trying to tell me what I was feeling or what I was supposed to be feeling.

In college, when i finally did start talking to my friends about my feelings — I had finally figured out and admitted that they were romantic and sexual in nature at that point — I had friends who were all too happy to offer their advice on what I should do.  Some wanted me to pray away the gay.  Others wanted me to just accept that I was gay.  To be honest, I found both sets of advice to be rather unhelpful, because I knew I had to figure out what I wanted and needed to do.  I wished that more of my friends had been more willing to simply let me talk things out and exploring what I was feeling at the time.

So as I read that search phrase, I found myself hoping that the person who submitted it has at least friend that can do that for them.

As an aside, I have recently created a contact form for anyone who wishes to reach me.  Because I’m always willing to listen too.  Confidentiality guaranteed.

 

Gender and Sexuality, Politics

Asking to be treated like everyone else is demanding “special rights”: Immigration edition

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Same Sex CouplesRight now, Congress is working on legislation for immigration reform.  Some people have had this “radical” idea that such reform should also speak to the fact that in some parts of our country, same-sex couples can legally get married.  After all, our laws already take people’s marriage to different-sex couples into account when making immigration decisions (e.g. we generally let an immigrant who is married to a citizen stay in the country), so it only makes sense to give married same-sex couples the same kind of consideration.

Unless you’re someone like Eugene Delgaudio, who had this to say about the idea in a recent fundraising email he sent on behalf of the Public Advocate of the United States:

You see, the Homosexual Immigration Act would give homosexuals a preferred immigration status and lead to the defacto nationalization of homosexual “marriage.”

Pay close attention to that statement.  According to people like Eugene Delgaudio, acknowledging that same-sex couples who went through the same process to gain the same legal recognition of their relationship as many different-sex couples and therefore deserve the same legal considerations that those different-sex couples receive — and often take for granted — is giving them a “preferred immigration status.”

Placing people on equal legal ground now constitutes “privileging” them?  Is there any evidence that would be more convincing than this that people like Eugene Delgaudio really have no idea what words “privilege” and “preferential status” mean?

I also think that it’s telling that he mentions this “granting of preferred immigration status” before the idea of “nationalizing homosexual ‘marriage.'”  It suggests that for all the anti-gay rhetoric about “protecting marriage” and “making sure every child has a mother and father,” the real motivation behind fighting marriage equality is that it still gives them ways to treat LGBT people as second-class citizens.  Stop and think about it.  If they deny that there can be such a thing as same sex marriage, they can continue to claim that treating same-sex couples with the same dignity and respect is perfectly okay.  Breaking up same-sex couples through deportation is okay because they were never a “real” couple.

That is an act of aggression against same-sex couples.  It’s an act of bigotry.  It’s an act of bigotry that is enabled by every person who opposes marriage equality, especially those who refuse to acknowledge how the lack of marriage equality negatively impacts same-sex couples.

 

Gender and Sexuality, Society

Why are anti-gay people so confused about consent?

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[Content Note:  Rape culture, Sexual Abuse, Anti-Gay Bigotry]

Yesterday afternoon, Zack Ford of ThinkProgress reported on a new statement by NARTH that’s intended to encourage the Boy Scouts of America to continue to exclude gay, bisexual, and (presumably) transgender boys from joining their ranks.  It’s the usual mash-up of misinformation about promiscuous gay men, heightened health risks, and gay people as sexual predators.  Zack does a good job of providing links that deconstruct the information.

However, I want to take a closer look at one of the excerpts from the statement that Zack quoted:

How will child protection be assured? If openly homosexual boys are allowed to participate, how does a Scoutmaster monitor the influence or actions that these boys may have upon others in the troop especially during overnight events?

As someone who has spent some time in feminist circles, I think that the answer is quite obvious:  You teach all the boys involved about consent.  You teach them that they have a right to say no to the advances — be it an offer of a hug or something more physically intimate — of any of their peers.  You also teach them that it is absolutely essential that they respect the boundaries of their peers and do not cross those boundaries without freely given (as in not coerced) and informed consent.  You teach them that if a peer does not respect their boundaries, they should immediately talk to the leaders about it and reassure them that the leaders will be sympathetic and take the matter and their safety seriously.  In short, I don’t think “protecting” boys in this situation is exactly rocket science.

But then again, I have no problem with the idea of consent.  I expect others to respect boundaries and I support those who speak up when their boundaries are violated.  I’m not convinced the same can be said for all — or even many — who raise the specter of sexual abuse when the topic of LGBT people comes up.

I’ve noticed for some time that there seems to be a lot of overlap between those who believe that LGBT people — especially gay and bisexual men and trans* women — are sexual predators and those who think that men in general are incapable of controlling their sexual impulses.  The difference is that when such people think about cis, heterosexual men — they assume that this is just natural and that others — most notably women — should adjust their lives and choices to protect those men from their hard-to-control urges.1  After all, they argue that those men ultimately can’t help themselves.  Insisting they respect consent just doesn’t work.

So it’s no wonder they automatically assume that teaching and enforcing consent won’t work with gay, bisexual, and trans boys.  Many of them are likely invested in ignoring the whole concept of consent anyway.  Which tends to make their pleas to “think of the potential victims of sexual abuse” sound rather hollow to me.

Of course, the other thing is that ultimately, I think that what NARTH and people like them are really afraid of isn’t that boys will get molested by their fellow scouts.  Instead, I suspect that they are worried that closeted and frightened scouts might actually meet and discover other boys like them and learn that being gay, bisexual, or trans* isn’t so bad.2  Because in greater scheme of things, that is one way in which NARTH and other folks like them are especially hostile to consent:  They don’t want LGBT people to feel like they have the choice to truly be themselves.

1I mean, stop and think about those two statements.  First:  “Heterosexual men are just sexual and aggressive by nature, so women should stay where they are safe and avoid tempting those men.”  Second:  “Gay men are just sexual and aggressive by nature, so gay men should be kept away from heterosexual men in order to protect the heterosexual men.”  Notice the one thing that is consistent between those two arguments?

2Yeah, the anti-gay animus and stigma can be pretty rotten at times.  But being gay itself?  It’s actually pretty okay.  (I’ll leave it to those who are bi and/or trans* to comment on whether they feel the same way about their own sexuality and/or gender identity.  I don’t want to speak for others.)