I'm feeling a lot better about myself (and I have irl friends now), but that leads me to another issue. I'm emotionally stable, so I can start thinking about things that might've been too much for me back when I was still struggling to keep myself emotionally stable. And this includes thinking about which parts of me would be accepted by others and which parts I'd have to do a bit more explaining about. This is pretty much just going to be another rant in which I have too many thoughts and not enough words. Please also note that I'm still a confused teen about halfway through highschool and trying to figure out herself and the world.
I'm going to start this off with the concept of sexuality, because why the heck not? That's pretty much how I started thinking about this whole acceptance issue, anyways. I honestly didn't think too much about it until I was in a phone call with my aunt. After all, the friends that I have told all accept me. My brother accepts me. So I was in this phone call with my aunt.
Me: Mom doesn't like me going to Izaiah's house.
Aunt: It's cuz he's a boy, isn't it? (laughs) She doesn't want you to date and she thinks you're going to kissy-kissy!
Me: (kind of testing the waters with a half-joke) Well, maybe I should just go date a girl, then!
Aunt: OMG Like a lesbian? Are you a lesbian? That's so gross. Do you think about kissing other girls? Eugh, that's so gross!
I'll probably get into the issue with my mom's overprotective tendencies (which I think a lot of teenagers get. It's just where they stem from that's making me think.) later. For the time being, let's focus on my aunt's words. So she thinks it's gross. ...That's admittedly not what I expected from her. Then again, I have established her to be both sexist and racist in the past, so why is this any different? I guess I would have to say that it's because it hits a lot closer than the other two incidents. It's a lot harder to laugh it off when it's just this close to becoming a direct insult.
I... feel like I am pan? But I feel like it's easier to say that I'm bi, that there's less explaining to do in an already long list of explanations. Overall, I like looking at people. I have been able to imagine myself, in both romantic and sexual situations, with a lot of different people. Of course, I'm still a teen. There's hormones to think about. And I most certainly don't intend to start dating quite yet. The thought of tying myself down to one person, of commitment, is rather frightening.
I might've just asked a friend if he'd refer to someone as they/them/theirs rather than he/him/his or /she/her/hers. He said he would for a while. I asked him, what if it's someone that he thinks of as a guy or a girl, who looks, to him, like a guy or girl. Like me or our other friend. He said "You both look like girls...." and that therefore, he wouldn't.
I feel kind of conflicted about this. On one hand, I... guess I identify as a girl? I'm honestly not quite sure. Maybe I'm a demigirl (mostly identifying as a girl)? And part of this confusion might stem from my parents, who are of the belief still that girls should learn to cook, sew, and clean, and that girls are weaker than guys. This mindset has caused me to think before that I would rather be a guy. My current verdict is pretty much just that I should probably think about this a bit more. Maybe I'm cis. Who knows.
I've stated my views on representation in media in that last post, so I won't say too much. I'm thinking that my angry vomit of feelings might not have been too comprehensive about how it feels, though. It's like... looking around you, for someone like you, and not seeing it. You look in the book, and everyone else has someone that they identify with. "This girl's problems are like mine!" "She likes the same things I do!" "He's cool! I want to be like him!" And someone tells you, "Well, they never state this character is straight. Maybe they're bi." And, yeah, okay, maybe. But I can think all I want. I can pretend there's more bi people. I can also pretend myself some friends. That doesn't mean a thing.
And it especially doesn't mean a thing when you look at a book, look into that world, and your kind just happens to be not there. But then you're looking in all these worlds. And your kind is still not there. It's like they don't exist. It's like you don't exist. Like there's all these types of heterosexual people. Cat-lovers and horse-lovers and geeks and nerds and jocks and cheerleaders and rockstars and writers and detectives and whatever. But how many types of bisexual people are there? Can you name any bisexual characters from fiction? Any where they're the main character?
And I'm sure there's a lot of arguments to this, things like "Straight people would not be able to empathize with a bisexual character." This implies, of course, that straight people are more important. That the fact that I cannot empathize with many book characters means absolutely nothing to the straight people who cannot empathize with this singular bisexual character when there are already so many books about heterosexual white characters. That I cannot be spared a few cookies because you need this entire jar.
And this is not me hating on straight white people or whatever. I just need a book that I can empathize with. That feeling, when you see a character with some trait that you also have (you both like cats, you both have long hair you really like, you both have overbearing parents, you're both nerds, you both want to become doctors, you're both Chinese-American), where you're really happy and it's like "Hey! They're like me!". I really would like to feel more of that as well. That's all I'm asking for.
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