Homophobia and Sexuality
Why is homophobia the last thing that we think about? There are "at least ten percent of...students will be or already are lesbians and gay males." (Smith, The Lesbian and Gay Studies Reader,101) How is it that a tenth of our population is cast off as unimportant? Assuming that everyone either fits in to the gay/straight binary is quite absurd as well. What if we were to include gender queers and bisexuals? Would that number increase? Where do we draw the line for straight and gay/lesbian? Within the feminist agenda, there are women's issues as well as issues of race and class, but sexuality tends to be last on the list.
When I was younger, I always wondered what people did if they weren't "normal," meaning straight. I was taught about sex by my girlfriends in middle school. My parents decided that the best way to avoid the awkward sex conversation was to never have it. I never wanted to ask questions about sex because I was ignorant and didn't want to look stupid, and when I did ask questions, they were generalized so that my friends could answer however they liked.
One of my friends came home this weekend, and she and I got to talking about sexuality assumptions. She is a women's studies major and has only declared her bisexuality to a few friends, myself including. Whenever she attends LGBT meetings on campus, members are always ready to assure her that straight people are welcome, that you do not have to be gay to be apart of the meetings.
When I thought about this, I wondered why members of the LGBT community would use stereotypes and judge people based on how they look and what they wear. This bothers me alot. Why judge people when you yourself do not want to be judged?
Back to my original inquiries, I have one thought. I wonder if how you identify yourself is how we draw the line in society. For example, if I were to identify myself as a bisexual woman, does that make me heterosexual or a homosexual based on my current relationship or lack of? No oppression should ever be dismissed or thought of as unimportant. In many schools today, teachers press the fact that color makes no difference, that race isn't important. According to Audre Lorde, "Ignoring the differences of race between women and the implications of those differences presents the most serious threat to the mobilization of women's joint power." (Lorde, Sister Outsider, 117) However, although recognization of differences is important, the fact that women of different races do not share the same experiences and that is an issue within recognization. Based on sexuality, race, class and age, women suffer from different oppressions. No one is the same, which makes defining feminism so hard.
So, now that we know and recognize it, where do we start?