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I have recently started seeing a girl (that I like an awful lot) that has been a lesbian for the past 4 years (now 18). She faced criticism when she came out of the closet, but quickly adapted to her new sexuality, and quickly made friends with the fairly sizable alternate/gay "movement" where I live. This is not exclusive or anything, and I get on very well with most people, it is just that there is a certain group of friends especially that sticks together.
Anyway after breaking up with her girlfriend of 3 years she was kind of confused, and I talked to her about much of this. Basically we found that we both liked each other, and she wasn't sure where she wasat anyway, but she felt she was more bisexual than lesbian. We have started spending a lot of time together lately, but (although jokingly at first) her old group has turned on her slightly, feeling she is "letting down the side" and suggesting that her sexuality was a fashionable thing even.
Now as I am sure many of you here are aware, we can feel differently about people at different times in our lives, I know I am much more bicurious than I was a few years ago, but has anyone else experienced this kind of porejudice when coming clean about new preferences? It seems to me (based on more than just this example) that people can generally find a group within which they are accepted (if not general society), but when a group is tied by something as trivial as sexuality, a change can be divisive. I am not excluded from being friends with group I am referring to, and because of the nature of small Island life Iknew several of the people before they came out, it is just that I was never included in quite the same way. Now it is as if the girl I have been talking about has been relegated to an outsider sort of status......
Again this might just be to do with group dynamics, and may not be representative at all, perhaps it should be moved to chit-chat, I was just wondering whether or not anyone else had experienced this?
I've witnessed a similar thing happen. It's probably more to do with group dynamic, as when a drug addict announces they're quitting, other drug using friends take it very badly. I know one girl who said she was giving up weed to a friend, who promptly screamed at her in rage.
-Alex
The walls pull back, they are transparent and they pull back... love can create this feeling, or art; it is rare to feel it in society, where one is almost always confronted with a kind of obligatory inertia, where the activity one pursues goes almost always hand in hand with the painful feeling of its limitations. But during the strike, we could touch it with our fingers, rub our hands across its back.
I think in part it is a group thing, especially because you live in a small community. But I think what you're talking about is particularly a problem with sexuality- for a number of reasons I guess. There's the general idea that sexuality is unchangable, and that if you do shift it must be because you were lying or being inauthentic at some stage, or that you are doing so now.
It's frustrating for sure, and I reckon it needs more discussion- both the sexuality aspect and the group identity formation issue.
Hear the words I sing,
War's a horrid thing,
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Ding-a-ling-a-ling.
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The last time I was sentenced to death, I ordered four hyper-vodkas for my breakfast. All a bit of a blur after that... I woke up in bed with both of my executioners. Lovely couple, they stayed in touch! Can't say that about most executioners. - Captain Jack Harkness
Is there something over and above this group thing though? I mean sure there are "societal" attitudes, but this is an aggregate (or perceived aggregate) of group oppinions anyway. When most of us experience any form of discrimination it is from a group of people, even if they are only united by why they oppose.
The drug example is valid as well, and it shows the impact of sub-cultures on a person, especially over and above that of mainstream society. What affects us most are the oppinions and actions of those closest to us (at least most of the time) and to me it seems that change (especially in sexuality) is a large factor in this.
If I announced that I was gay I am certain that there would be a shift in the oppinion of my peers towrds me, and I would term this as a form of discrimination. What I am trying to establish is whether or not it is change that is often discriminated against (when it moves against the trends of a group) and not necessarily the specifics. Again this is because we are often immersed in groups similar to ourselves, if so this would in part explain why we constantly maintain groups similar to ourselves.
I feel that it is a form of discrimination (and thus this thread should not be moved) for people to treat you differently based on your sexuality.
If this women felt that she was attracted to other women, then she realises that she can also be attracted to men, what is wrong with that? If the group feels put out because she is bisexual, then I say fuck the group. Discrimination by straight people against gay and lesbians is bad enough without discrimination by gay and lesbians against bisexuals or other queers.
A couple of stories that might vaguely be related to the thread:
I never really notice what sexuality a person is, sure it might be interesting if a person might be sexually interested in you, but beyond that who cares. The people who I spend time with mostly, I don't notice if they are queer or not.
I once asked the queer rep at my student union (a lesbian) what she thought of bisexuals. She said something along the lines of she did not think much of them and would not want a relationship with one. When asked why, it was because she felt that she (the bi) might go and have sex with a men. It was a completely irrational comment, I did not however, say so at the time.
I suppose in a way this is a little bit like the bisexual thread, and there is definitely a different form of discrimination experienced. When I asked my friends about her views (her ex, and her friends completely shunned her) she said she is more interested in the individual person than whatis in their pants, and that really summed a lot of things up for me and is possibly why I am a little more open to other things now.
I think that it is really dispointing that she is being shunned by her old 'friends'. Obviously if they cannot take her for who she is, if they are only interested in one aspect of her personality, then fuck 'em (not litterally).
Anyway, good luck with her, hopefully she finds some real friends who don't care about her sexuality.
You know, i'm not sure if this is exactly comperable to 'discrimination' per se.
There are several issues i think.
The first is that they simply resent the fact that she has, effectively, changed her social status to one other than the group's. The fact is that, regardless of how one might conceptualize herself, a girl in a long term relationship with a female is socially speaking a lesbian, and a girl in a long term relationship with a male is socially speaking straight. Given different dating circles, clubs scenes, pop culture, etc, this makes a difference in social status even if no discrimination enters into it, just as say switching from being a goth to being a yuppie would. Whether or not this is a legitimate source of resentment probably depends on how central the sexuality/cultural issues were to the group. If that was practically the only thing they had in common, then you'd think it would be a totally legitimate reason to distance themselves, but if it was only incidental, then its rather immature.
There is another issue, which has to be recongized, which is simply that many or even most gay people do not accept bisexuals self-narriative (see my footnote at the bottom). They might say that they are "more interested in the individual person than whatis in their pants" but this is simply so alien to how most people experiance their sexual attraction, which is very much based on physical desire concerning their body and physique, that it can come across as simply unbelievable. The fact is that most people's sexual preferences are sufficently narrow that they exclude most members of a gender on purely physical grounds, given the major physical differences between genders, it might be almost inconcievable that someone's physical preferences could be so general that they would actually prefer members of both genders. This is of course not to say that they wouldn't be willing to have sex with members of both genders, but when it comes to having actual comitted relationships, absolute preference rather than a minimal level of tolerance is required. Many straight girls who don't even try to conceptualize themselves as bisexual would be able to tolerate making out with a female friend, they would however not be capable of carrying on a romantic relationship with one because while they might be willing to kiss one they'd prefer to kiss a guy (and, not just any guy but one matching particular preferences). Whether or not, this assessment is *accurate* is debatable, but it is clearly something that has a degree of currency among non-bisexual people.
Lastly, i disagree with apathy maybe's assertion that its not acceptable to treat friends differently based on sexual orientation. The fact is that sexual orientation is socially relevant because sex and relationships are socially relevant. I wouldn't talk about guys in the same way in front of a straight male friend as i would in front of a female friend or gay male friend, simply because they wouldn't appreciate it and they might find it obnoxious (and, not to be hidious, but talking about people you think are attractive is a big part of conversation for a lot of groups of friends). Likewise, i wouldn't really want to share a room and get changed in front of a straight male friend, whereas i'd be more tolerant about it with a gay male, or straight female friend. Being a potential future parnter of a friend makes the social dynamics different than if there is no potential that you'd ever be involved sexually, and as dumb as it sounds a lot of people would probably try to act a bit more cool and slightly less relaxed in front of attractive friends who are potentially sexual interests. Also talking about specific sexual problems and subjects of that sort i think differ depending on sexual orietation...so really it *can* affect relationship dynamics including the level of social intimacy.
Footnote: selections from a major American gay columnist based in Seattle, Dan Savage,
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Dan Savage's earlier position:
http://www.thestranger.com/seattle/SavageLove?oid=2859
Dan Savage's later explaination:
http://www.thestranger.com/seattle/SavageLove?oid=31935
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Firstly, I did not say friends, I said people (in general). But I guess your point still stands. I accept that "sexual orientation is socially relevant because sex and relationships [is] socially relevant". However, in a group of friends how often do partners change with in that group?
And yes I take your point about not wishing to get change in front of a person who might be attracted to you and about not wishing to talk about certain subjects in front of some people and so on.
I still stand by my point (but I will modify it slightly), unless you are sexual interested in a person, to treat that person differently based on their sexuality is a form of discrimination.
In this current society it is more of a problem then in a hypothetical anarchist society, hopefully people will be a bit less ashamed of their bodies, and speaking for my self, I don't care if you talk about someone as a potential partner in front of me (though I admit others might).
Yah i know i was responding to it in the context of the origional post which was a group of friends growing distant to someone after they changed the sexual orientation they claimed to be; obviously if it was something like work collegues with a purely professional relationship it wouldn't matter but that wasn't the situation being discussed.
Does it matter? In a lesbian friendship group where not everyone has a gf, a single lesbian who isn't completely ugly or completely reserved is probably going be treated and regarded differently than a straight girl or boy in the group who isn't elligable in the same way.
Theres also a great deal of social interaction in friendship groups around potential or desired partners. If a lesbian with a friend who she thought was a lesbian found out that she was in fact for all intents and purposes straight, she couldn't really make girl-watching comments to her or fawn over an actress she liked in a film as frequently without being annoying, or without potentially making her friend who turned out to be straight uncomfortable. The "OMG so-and-so is SO hot" comments wouldn't work as well either if the hypothetical lesbian knows that her hypothetical straight friend doesn't really think so-and-so is hot.
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