lesbian guilt

[jmtorres]

I'm wandering through my bajillion open tabs, as one does at four in the morning, and just read this essay on bisexuality by gyzym, posted earlier this month and which I probably set aside during finals week. I have no idea where I was linked from, more's the pity.

Anyway, after reading it, I felt compelled to comment about my own sexuality in-the-ways-that-it-intersects-with-bisexuality and well, I'll reproduce it here:

deep thoughts on attraction and the self-limiting factors of labels

I'm about 4.5 on the Kinsey scale and I identify as lesbian. But the fact that I am not a total six means sometimes there are dudes I find attractive (and sometimes really, really not--like I look at some of my fandom friends' objects of interest and am confused? like, I understand that other people are attracted to other things than me but I cannot grok it: like, say, Supernatural. I have heard those boy described as model pretty and... I don't see it. Imagine me with your porn headtilt.) but okay: on some level it's always weird to me when I find a dude attractive. I am more comfortable with attraction to dudes when they are pretty, even though my attraction to women covers a very broad range of looks and is not limited to pretty. But, like, for example... I don't know if you've ever watched Numb3rs? The premise is: two brothers! Charlie is a genius mathematician! Don is an FBI agent! TOGETHER THEY FIGHT CRIME! (And some other people. Charlie's hot mathematician gf? RAWWWWRRR can I have her for my very own, please.) But so, early on, I thought Charlie was cute, and I was okay with this, because especially in the early seasons when he has long hair he is totally the pretty one. Don, being the FBI agent, is totally the manly one. And then one day I caught myself looking at Don's lips and I was like WHAT. Like, it shocked me to be attracted to the manly dude (even if his lips were pretty).

I have lesbian guilt. I know this, and I know it's ridiculous, and I have it anyway. Like, regardless of attraction, I could never see myself with a dude, and part of it is I don't know how I would explain to people the "I am a lesbian dating a dude, no, don't try to make it make sense." And I can't even figure out the chicken and egg issue on that--can I not figure out how to explain it because it would never happen? or does fear of explaining it prevent it from happening? Maybe I would have an easier time in my own head if I identified as "bisexual with a preference for women" but I don't, lesbian is the identification that works for me (with that addendum about being a 4.5 on the Kinsey scale, where necessary). But holy crap does being a lesbian have some baggage if you are not a total six, and it astounds me that queer identities have enough of a cultural narrative attached that I can get mired in feeling guilty for being attracted to not the "right" kind of person when a heterosexual attraction could, technically, drop me into the dominant cultural narrative. I feel like, goddamnit, ALL THE STUPID BOXES CONTRADICT EACH OTHER.

So while I have a label and it is mine and I identify with it, oh my god, I wish society as a whole could chuck out labels.

(...hi. This is probably tangentially relevant to your entry at best, but um, I felt strongly and wanted to talk about it?)

In conclusion: why do I not have an Amita icon?

Comments

[jackandahat]

I wouldn't consider all of them to be, but while "People in the student union" is a self-selecting sample (since some people don't go to bars), it's not a queer sample.

We had about 23,000 in my uni - I'm not that ambitious.