LGBTQ+ 6 -- It's a Rainbow of Flavors

[Jen'ari]

1 hour ago, HelenaExMachina said:

I saw this too, utterly disgusting. Its so entitled and possessive to think that anyone of any gender or sexuality is there to satisfy your fancies. That aspect is bad enough, but then it was also a deliberate targetting based on sexual orientation. Its just all so reprehensible.

 

I was also sickened by some of the general public where i live too. I was in the pub last night and the story came up on the 10 o clock news. I was just sitting quiet with a friend so we could hear the talk at the bar. I heard the words “its sick.” And thought yes, indeed it is. Only to realise the talk at the bar was around the two ladies being gay. No comments on the attack, purely focused on how “sick” their relationship was.

i wish i could say i’d been brave and challenged that but i wasn’t, i just drank up and left quickly. Times like this are reminders that society has come a long way but there is a long way left to go

I think I’ve been very fortunate in that regard because I’ve only experienced a small amount of prejudice and homophobia, although I mostly get considered straight by strangers and I don’t bring up my sexuality unless there’s a reason to.

Overall though I think society has come a long way but it’s not good that people still have views like the people in the pub you were in last night.

I’ve also noticed, from personal experience that men seem to be more intolerant of someone of either gender being gay (especially of gay men) than women, when I told my friends when I was a teenager their responses were all overwhelmingly positive and along the lines of we have to find you a nice gf!, but one of my friends-a gay guy, came out at a similar age and had a nasty reception from some of his friends and felt miserable for ages.

[Varysblackfyre321]

Some more bad news:

https://www.bing.com/amp/s/www.nbcnews.com/news/amp/ncna1021031

 I do wonder/hope if it’s not so much there’s an increasing lack of tolerance in regards to LGBTQ issues or that the general perception of what people think of when they hear these questions of “LGBTQ” issues has skewed the answers. Like I imagine since Transgender individuals have been given a lot more focus over the years, the answers would have been effected. The questions are formatted the same, but the perception of what is being asked has evolved. 

Like it should be noted even among republicans the younger crowd amongst those in favor of gay marriage being allowed has gone up.

[Fez]

Hey all. Sorry if this seems ignorant, but I was hoping someone could let me know which, if any or all, of these terms are acceptable and commonly used in the community? And also if they are synonyms? And if there are other, more commonly used terms?

Non-cisgendered; person born with a uterus; transgendered man; person assigned-female-at-birth

We've realized at my job that we our language style guide doesn't cover this, and I don't know what an authoritative source on the this would be. Any help would be awesome.

[Xray the Enforcer]

2 hours ago, Fez said:

Hey all. Sorry if this seems ignorant, but I was hoping someone could let me know which, if any or all, of these terms are acceptable and commonly used in the community? And also if they are synonyms? And if there are other, more commonly used terms?

Non-cisgendered; person born with a uterus; transgendered man; person assigned-female-at-birth

We've realized at my job that we our language style guide doesn't cover this, and I don't know what an authoritative source on the this would be. Any help would be awesome.

A couple of things.

1) please do not use "transgendered" or "cisgendered". The correct terms are "transgender" and "cisgender" because these are things that people are, not things that happened to them. 

2) I've never seen the term "non-cisgender" used by people in the community, although I suppose it's not the worst thing. I'd avoid it, though, and say "transgender or non-binary individuals." Also note that "nb" as shorthand  for "non-binary" should be avoided, because that term is already in use in the Black community to mean "non-Black." 

3) "person assigned X at birth" is generally considered acceptable. 

4) I'd steer clear of using someone's anatomy as a descriptor. It's really invasive and is nobody's business. I need to run to a meeting but I will try to come up with an alternative for you. 

Thank you for asking these questions! I really appreciate that you're trying to get things correct and want to be inclusive in your language. 

[The Mother of The Others]

This is a cross-over event with the drunk topic:

    Mount Gay Black Barrel Rum

Available for $24.99

Black Barrel Mule:

1oz lemon juice,  .5 oz simple syrup, and 1 strawberry muddled together.  Add 1.5 oz rum, shaken with ice, strained over Other ice.   Top with 2 oz ginger beer, 2 dashes of bitters, and a slice of lime.

 

I'm not a mule expert, just passing along the relevant gay info.  The most flamboyant sounding drink I fancy is the Bird of Paradise Fizz.   I don't go for any of the drinks that are actually flaming, as that seems like a rip off if the booze is burning away before you even get hold of it.   Well, that's all.

 

Also, what's with the Q?    Does that cover additional people not mentioned in the LGTB part, or is thrown in there more as a summary caboose for the acronym?   

[Yet another Arya !]

@The Mother of The Others the Q is for queer (but a person L, G, B and/or T could himself/herself Q as well). We can add a I for intersex, a A for asexual, and the + for everything that we failed to describe/we forgot/that don't need to be labelled acording the persons concerned. To sum up, the very term "LGBTQIA+ and so on" is the most inclusive possible. :-)

Thanks for the "gay" recipe!

[felice]

2 hours ago, The Great Unwashed said:

Hi all, sincere apologies for posting here, but I have followed this thread for a while to try and educate myself and I don't want to be imposing or anything, but I  was really hoping for some advice for a dad.

Nah, you're in the right place! It's great that you want to be supportive.

2 hours ago, The Great Unwashed said:

He's worried what his mom will say because she's kind of conservative. Should I try to get him in my home so that he maybe feels safer during this time?

It's a legitimate worry, though hopefully she'll pleasantly surprise you. It's hard to advise on living arrangements without being familiar with the family dynamic, but letting him know there's a place for him in your home if he needs it seems like a good plan. Let him know he's welcome, but don't pressure him.

2 hours ago, The Great Unwashed said:

I'm going to find him a counselor so he can talk about his friend's suicide attempt, but should I search for a counselor with an LGBTQ emphasis?

One who's explicitly LGBT-friendly, certainly.

[karaddin]

4 hours ago, felice said:

Nah, you're in the right place! It's great that you want to be supportive.

It's a legitimate worry, though hopefully she'll pleasantly surprise you. It's hard to advise on living arrangements without being familiar with the family dynamic, but letting him know there's a place for him in your home if he needs it seems like a good plan. Let him know he's welcome, but don't pressure him.

One who's explicitly LGBT-friendly, certainly.

Bolded - Yeah, unless he's specifically asking for it/struggling with acceptance or understanding of his sexuality I think going with an explicitly LGBTQ friendly counselor who regularly treats teens but isn't focused specifically on gender and sexuality is the way to go to start with. It makes it clear to him that its the clearly upsetting and possibly traumatic suicide attempt of his friend that you think needs help healing - it can't be misconstrued as thinking his sexuality inherently needs help.

A good counselor fitting that criteria that he connects with would draw that out anyway and if he needs the more specialist help he will hopefully ask for it.

I don't know whether you should proactively try to get him into your house, but making it 100% clear that he belongs there whenever he wants to be should help him feel more secure. I'd also say don't pressure him to come out to his mum, he needs to decide the time for that on his own and may want to leave his living situation as is for now and not rock the boat. There's so much going on in teen years, having the certainty that he's loved and has a home regardless might be all he needs for now. Of course if he does want to come out to her then support him in all ways you can in tackling that.

This probably goes without saying, but under no circumstances ever tell his mum without it being his choice. Coming out is his choice, and telling you is a big leap of trust - it's hugely important that trust isn't betrayed.

For questions to ask - I don't have any particular suggestions there, I think it's really a matter of judging how much and what he wants to talk about and matching the questions to that. There's so much variety to what people are comfortable with that its an individual thing. Just be clear in the way you word everything that its your interest in him and love for him behind it, not anything that could sound like you're testing his feelings for a way to invalidate them.

What's the social views of the area? Is it a broadly accepting population, or a more conservative one?

ETA: My wife pointed out that even some "LGBTQ friendly" professionals can be really shitty when it comes to biphobia, so if you've got multiple options it's worth looking for someone that's recommended in bisexual resources specifically rather than general LGBTQ.

Edited October 24, 2019 by karaddin

[Jen'ari]

12 hours ago, The Great Unwashed said:

Hi all, sincere apologies for posting here, but I have followed this thread for a while to try and educate myself and I don't want to be imposing or anything, but I  was really hoping for some advice for a dad. So, I think my 17 year old son just came out to me as bisexual in a text. I texted him back (because he lives with his mom and he's supposed to be in bed), and told him that I'm glad he told me, and asked if I could pick him up tomorrow so we could talk about it if he wanted. He said that was good. 

So, I was hoping I could ask a few questions? 

He's worried what his mom will say because she's kind of conservative. Should I try to get him in my home so that he maybe feels safer during this time?

Also, what are some questions to ask that are informative but not offensive? For context, he told me he was confused. He's had a long-term girlfriend, and I assumed they were sexually active. He has stayed at her house a few times, and I bought him condoms and told him to come back when he needed more if he didn't feel comfortable buying them. As far as any same-sex experience, I don't know. He also said that his friend tried to commit suicide last night, and then told me about thinking that he may be bisexual (my words, not his), so I'm not sure if this is an indication of some kind of relationship, or he's having curiosity because of the intense feelings he's having with his friend's attempted suicide? I apologize if I'm being insensitive, I just want to make sure that I don't ask questions that may accidentally alienate him.

I'm going to find him a counselor so he can talk about his friend's suicide attempt, but should I search for a counselor with an LGBTQ emphasis? Thank you for taking the time to read this.

I can’t really offer you any specific advice, other than be there for him and listen and be supportive, know that he must trust you a great deal to tell you before his mother and you must mean a lot to him.

When I came out as lesbian to my dad he was amazing, very supportive and was just there for me, I was a little younger than your son is now and his support meant so much to me.

Sorry I can’t give any better advice than that, I’m also very sorry to hear about your sons friend attempting suicide.

[Ormond]

Forgive me if this topic has been mentioned before as I am not able to read this thread regularly.

"Best Buy" is a nationwide chain of electronics and appliances stores in the United States. This morning a member of my church who is the manager of a large Best Buy in suburban Omaha told me Best Buy has initiated a nationwide policy where all employees are able to have the pronouns they wish to be called by put on their name tags. I was rather surprised that a retail chain like Best Buy has taken this progressive step and wondered if anyone on this thread knows of other retail organizations that are doing this.

https://www.bestbuy.com/?ref=212&loc=BM01&ds_rl=1260441&ds_rl=1266837&ds_rl=1268709&ds_rl=1266837&gclid=Cj0KCQjw9fntBRCGARIsAGjFq5EkPEBYru1kzfmZ_wRiT-bdrflpD8brBTK9oOt9TKLGtpGXbc7qI38aAvydEALw_wcB&gclsrc=aw.ds

[felice]

This might be of interest to some of you: https://www.boosted.org.nz/projects/rurangi - "a fiercely contemporary new drama series written, produced by and starring transgender talent."

[Toth]

I had today a rather interesting moment that I'd like to share.

So... I'm a teacher... and if you have seen my latest post where I was worrying about the tensions in one of my classes due to Erdogan's invasion of Syria, you know that I work with classes that have a very high migration background, about 70% and mostly Turkish. Today I had with that class again, though not Politics, but Computer Science instead. The students had to make short presentations of "Pioneers of Computer Science", the exercise was obviously more about the making of presentations than anything else, but the topic is interesting enough and I thought I could provoke some surprises by offering them an equal amount of male and female pioneers instead of the usual history of boring old men that you get too often. The history of Computer Science makes that quite easy, what with the software aspect being heavily female dominated up until 70s toxic nerd culture wrecked the gender balance.

Anyway... long story short, the students didn't react much at all the stories of awesome female pioneers writing the first code, sending people to the moon, cracking the enigma etc. Which I hope had to do with them not thinking it unusual. What however they DID find unusual and which causes me to write here was the presentation of Alan Turing and how the persecution of his homosexuality drove him to suicide. That caught the students by surprise and caused a barrage of question. Why was it treated as a crime? What even is homosexuality? How did the perception of it change? Which countries are still criminalizing it?

Remember, 70% Muslim background. Several of the students came into the conversation with either no knowledge whatsoever or had picked up some rather troubling notions. What made the discussion so open and productive however was that even those entered it not treating their image as truth, but as a question. It was not "Homosexuality is a desease.", it was "Is Homosexuality a desease?". There was a genuine curiosity for the right answer there. And with questions you can work. The students had to define what a desease is and quite quickly came to the conclusion that it can't be. The next question then was "Is it a fetish then?", which once again caused them to scramble for an answer, with me barely intervening at all.

That it all started with the questioning of the persecution of one man also had the added bonus that at the end of the tangent we came back to this question and voiced the conclusion that the main reason for it being treated as a deviancy was a silence on the matter. An adherence to what is assumed normal and what not, one mostly created by religion. And that society only changed because of the thing we just did: Talk about it. Removing the shroud of strangeness and shame and treat any sexuality as a thing we can understand and accept.

I must admit I was quite proud of my class there.^^ Despite being obviously also a bit troubled that 16/17 years olds living in Berlin of all places still had such a vague notion of what homosexuality is.

Edited November 22, 2019 by Toth

[Mr. Chatywin et al.]

I felt like this was worth sharing given the reputation of homophobia in sports and in the AA community. Retired NBA legend Dwayne Wade opens up about evolving and accepting that his son is not only gay, but likely trans, and the process of learning why it's right to refer to him as her. Here's the best excerpt and I'll link the full story which has a link to the interview itself below:

Quote

“I’ve watched my son from Day 1 become into who she now eventually has come into. Nothing changes [with] my love; nothing changes [with] my responsibilities. Only thing I got to do now is get smarter and educate myself more. And that’s my job.”

............................................................................................................................................................................................................

I had to look myself in the mirror when my son at the time was 3 years old and my wife started having conversations about us noticing that he wasn’t on the boy vibe that Zaire was on. And, I had to look myself in the mirror and say, 'What if your son comes home and tells you he’s gay? What are you going to do? How are you going to be?’”

“It’s not about him. He knows who he is. It’s about you. Who are you? All these people that are out there saying those things — look at yourself. Understand that you’re the one that got the issue; you’re the one that has the problems. It’s not the kids.”

https://sports.yahoo.com/dwyane-wade-describes-becoming-less-ignant-while-watching-gay-son-become-who-she-now-is-135647247.html

Edited December 20, 2019 by Tywin et al.

[Martini Sigil]

This president we have in America has given racist and homophobes --small minded bigots of any kind-- the confidence to come out on force, and be open about their hate... even in Blue New Jersey....  

I look ethnic (Italian)... It's pretty obvious that I have a vowel at the end of my name.... and I never fail to be surprised at how racist gay-hating shitbags just assume that because I look like a sopranos extra, that I must be one of them.... they say the most fucked up things to me, and then act defensive when i cut them off... every friggin' time. ... it used to happen occasionally, since Trump, it happens all the damn time. 

[Varysblackfyre321]

I’ve stumbled across this article when I was researching on how those who have a binary view of sex could explain the intersex. Whenever I’ve broached this concept individually with some types, they simply restate sex is completely binary.

Quote

There is a difference, however, between the statements that there are only two sexes (true) and that everyone can be neatly categorized as either male or female (false). The existence of only two sexes does not mean sex is never ambiguous. But intersex individuals are extremely rare, and they are neither a third sex nor proof that sex is a “spectrum” or a “social construct.” Not everyone needs to be discretely assignable to one or the other sex in order for biological sex to be functionally binary. To assume otherwise—to confuse secondary sexual traits with biological sex itself—is a category error.

This article basically does just that. 

Restate that intersex people could be labeled man or woman  and offers no third alternative despite the possibility an intersex  may have a penis and labia, or A testicle and ovary. It offers no method what to do in such a situation. I fear perhaps it's advocating for surgery to ”correct” a person’s genitalia.

And proceeds to fear-monger about how transgenders are the true threats to women and gay rights. It's quite maddening when people try to pass their transphobia off as just being some ”Progressive.” worry.

[Varysblackfyre321]

I know this is a little late but:

https://www.google.com/amp/s/www.metroweekly.com/2020/01/intersex-navy-veteran-asks-10th-circuit-to-uphold-ruling-allowing-them-to-get-gender-neutral-passport/amp/

I just have to wonder if this, or any other case featuring discrimination against an intersex individual gets to the Supreme Court what possible rational could the conservative Justices give for it being permissible. 

[Fez]

Last night I heard the news that's been spreading through my family, which is that a cousin of mine has come out as transgendered. As far as I can tell, the family's been supportive; although I know she and her parents have years of tension covering all sorts of issues between them that I'm sure exists. This isn't a cousin I'm particularly close to, I think I've only seen her maybe 3 times in the past 10 years, so I don't think there's much I could provide in way of support. But there are some big family milestones coming up in the next couple years that I suspect we'll both be at. So I was wondering, what are some tips for making sure I'm being sensitive when I do see her?

For instance, the name she used to have has a very widely used feminine version, but she didn't choose that as her new name. She chose something else. Is it okay to ask her about that if we're making conversation at a family gathering? Or is that too personal to talk about with a relatively distant cousin? (Although, on this side of the family, I'm her only cousin; we're a small family, but distant) How much should I press about how things are going for her and whether there's anything I could do for her? (We are distant, but she's still family). She's had a pretty rough life the past 5-6 years, and I don't know how much stems from stress related to this, versus other things entirely.

[Ormond]

26 minutes ago, Fez said:

For instance, the name she used to have has a very widely used feminine version, but she didn't choose that as her new name. She chose something else. Is it okay to ask her about that if we're making conversation at a family gathering? Or is that too personal to talk about with a relatively distant cousin? (Although, on this side of the family, I'm her only cousin; we're a small family, but distant) How much should I press about how things are going for her and whether there's anything I could do for her? (We are distant, but she's still family). She's had a pretty rough life the past 5-6 years, and I don't know how much stems from stress related to this, versus other things entirely.

As someone who has asked several transgender persons about the name issue -- I think it would be perfectly fine to ask her why she chose the name she did. But phrase it that way -- that's much better than asking her why she did NOT choose a feminized version of her birth name.

[karaddin]

Yeah if that were me then asking why I didn't stick with the feminine version of my old name would hurt me - delineating a point of difference way well be part of the point and it's nicer when that's just accepted rather than interrogated. 

As for what may be supportive, it might seem small but zero hesitation before using the right pronouns and name are really quite massive. Especially when you first say hello, that's the part I still dread with family I don't see often even 7 years on.

[HexMachina]

I would also suggest its something there is no single rulebook on. Some general points like karradin suggests are of course good starting points, but everyone is going to be different, so what is comfortable for your cousin may be the nightmare scenario for others. 

Also, as a small point, and others can correct me if i am talking twaddle - i thought the generally accepted phrasing/terminolgy would be: “... a cousin of mine has come out as transgender..” rather than transgendered?