Hetero-normative culture and its effect on you

Heteronormativity does hurt and oppress people within the LGBTQ community though, as it perpetuates the falsehood that everyone is to assume that everyone is straight or cisgender and any variant from those two is wrong. The argument that everywhere on earth is heteronormative is also not a very convincing one, as at one time western culture used to be very whitenormative and people of color were marginalized, oppressed and put down for being a different skin tone, and that didn't make that any less of a reality.

To answer OP's question I can say that heteronormative culture has affected me because multiple times people have asked me and my boyfriend if we're friends or roommates, and having family members downplay my relationship while hoisting up my straight cousin's relationship are all examples of heteronormative thinking playing out. Also, whenever me and my boyfriend hold hands on campus and elderly people give us dirty looks also just shows me that many people wished queer people simply did not exist, or at least be able to freely express themselves as queer, which is also something heteronormative culture advocates for.

 

It's affected me. When I was growing up, I didn't even know there was such a thing as a gay person. I thought everyone was straight because I never knew any gay people. I only heard about them because after I got so old, my dad would bitch about gay people in front of me. He HATES gay people. So he never said anything good. Made me think all gay people were evil, disgusting, going to hell, etc. And I certainly didn't know there were bi people, or trans people, or anything else like that. I only started learning about the LGBT community in high school. One of my friends was a lesbian, before coming out as a transmale. So he helped me learn a lot about it. But I didn't realize I was bi/pan til I was 18. Partly because of the heteronormative culture and the whole assumption that being LGBT was bad. Because a lot of people where I live think it's a bad thing. I heard soo many jokes about "faggots." It was thrown around as an insult. A gay guy in my school was constantly bullied for being gay. My lesbian friend was bullied for being a dyke. People's behavior was negative and disgusting. So it took me a long time to come to terms with the fact that being LGBT was okay.

And I hate how everyone assumes everyone is straight! I get that all the time. I always have. Now, part of it now is because I have a boyfriend. But that doesn't mean I can't be bi or pan or omni or any of those other labels! Just because I like penis doesn't mean that's the ONLY thing I like! I hate assumptions. I just play along with it though. Most people I deal with on a regular basis don't know I'm pan. I don't want to get crap for it. I'm sure I would, with where I live and work. I wish that some guys would include me in on the conversation of girls though. I find them attractive too, dang it!

And I agree with H20 and Sean2. I dislike how people think stay-at-home moms are great, but stay-at-home dads are pieces of crap. That's not the case at all. We don't have children, but my boyfriend didn't have a job for a while. And while he didn't, he took care of the house stuff for me. It was fair to us, since I was paying the bills. It worked for us. Doesn't mean he's a piece of crap. I think it does stem from femininity being thought of as lower than masculinity. So for a man to be "feminine" is him "stooping down" to women's level, which should never happen.
I also dislike how everyone assumes that women want to have babies. I can only stand children for snall amounts of time. There is no way that I would be able to raise children. I would not be a good mother because I wouldn't be able ti handle it. It would drive me insane. If it wouldn't mess with my hormones and make me go into menopause early, I'd just get a hystoand be done with it. Because I never, NEVER want children. I really hate when people ask about that. It's definitely worse when they try changing your mind, like they know your feelings better or know what's better for you...

 

I grew up in a place where lgbt people were almost non existent, although one guy came out in school and every girl wanted to be her friend after that. It was that time i guess, everyone just had to have a gay best friend. Although he got bullied a lot too, mostly by boys.

The main thing that got my nerves and still does is that everyone seems to think that all girls like same things. I'm quite masculine in my looks and interests but still everyone classifies me as a typical girl. They think i like pedicures and other girly stuff.

And many activities also include dividing people into groups based on gender. Women do something girly while men do something awesome. I of course recognize that most women and men do like the stereotypical stuff. I still hope that people could just see me how i look and think that i might not be like typical women are. And those people are usually my colleagues or acquaintances so they have also talked with me about my interests too. I guess gender roles are just so deep inside people that they can't see anything beyond them.

 

Well, the worst effect it had on me is that I didn't know trans people existed until I was like 15.

I remember knowing about gay people when I was 4. I didn't think it was a bad thing either. I would assume some characters in radio shows were lesbians (they were a straight couple) because they both had high pitched voices. My parents didn't think gay people were bad either. So, in school, we had many presentations from gay associations telling us that being gay was okay etc.

However, we never had that for trans people. I literally knew NOTHING until I turned 15. I'm pissed at society for not telling me about it because that's what I was. I would have known so much earlier if I knew this was an option. I wasted years of my life being confused and unhappy because of it. I mean, everyone knows what being gay is, by that time. However, if you say you're trans, you have to explain it...

Anyway, after I came out as trans, people assumed I liked girls, again... Though, many of my friends tell me that they just have no clue about what my sexuality is, so I guess it goes both ways.

 

Not teaching me that my sexuality even exists in Health class, and going about it as if the entire class was 100% straight, parents insisting you have children after you've told them you're not going to. Very rude and immature comments in high school, etc...

It's a shame really, it could be fixed but only when people realize the problem in the first place.

 

I'm trying to figure where the stereotype came from that men who dress well are gay... or businessmen (honestly whenever I saw men who wore suits or more than casual clothes, they were like CEOs or bankers).

Dresssing well is dressing sexy in my opinion, but really? How'd anyone jump from slick and decent to "Ohmigod, he's gay!"

Like... really? :eusa_doh: It is funny, but still kinda frustrating. Ya know?

 

In terms of people assuming that you're straight... well yeah my family do but people my age generally assume I'm a lesbian. This used to really frustrate me because I knew I had some attraction to guys and because I was scared as fuck of lesbians for some reason... like I think it was just the unknown and the sort of hard super masculine stereotype... and because I didn't need some other negative thing attached to me when I was already the prime loser. And yeah, it was definitely in a negative way. I dunno, it effected me as in heterosexuality was presented as the only non-negative thing but it was never expected of me.

And yeah I didn't know anything about lesbians, which as I said added to this weird fear. I think there was one storyline on Eastenders once where Sonja has an affair with this lesbian girl when I was about 7 and it freaked the hell out of me, I barely knew this was a thing. And then when I was about 11 there was a program called Lip Service and that freaked me out even more because the main character seemed to just bully this girl into admitting shes gay (I watched it again recently and realised the girl had been eyeing her up the entire time she was just being coy) which made me freak out that lesbians were gonna try and turn me haha. There was definitely no education to help me understand so I just had this idea that a girl was gonna aggressively seduce me one day... Which doesn't sound too bad now but is weirdly scary at 12/13/14. I also thought lesbian relationships were pretty ridiculous because I couldn't work out for the life of me how they had sex... so dumb haha. But yeah, there was no education!

 

I spent far too long hanging around with straight people and not having hardly anything in common with them. I really noticed how straight women can be so competitive and bitchy with each other and love to laugh at other women for being virgins, I really suffered with that and even now I still do. Whereas gay and bisexual people are much more understanding about the differences and individual issues we all have.

 

This, but I was on a position that allowed me to get away with a ton of strange things, and quite pushy when I really wanted something. The place and time I grew up in was extremely homophobic and transphobic... Of course transmen didn't even existed, and I'll spare you what I heard about transwomen because just to repeat it would make my blood boil.
I needed to keep safe first, and sane second, and so far I guess I only did well half of the job. Shame and fear were normal in my daily life. At some points of my life I was just going through the motions so I could function. That's no life, just survival.

I define myself as straight because bisexual would explain it, and bi curious sounds awful, but I don't have much in common with them, and I'd rather spend my time with a gay or bisexual person anyday. It has more to do with how certain heterosexuals look at life, gender and sexuality than with heterosexuality itself.

 

That whole 'only gay guys dress well' stereotype is long dead in the water as far as I can tell - ever since the likes of David Beckham made 'metrosexuality' (otherwise known as actually caring about your appearance) cool. Also, hipsters. Hipsters are everywhere - and most of them are straight. Skinny jeans, plaid shirts, Converse.. every man and their dog seems to wear them.

Male fashion has come a long way in the past 10 years.. although I suspect it depends on where you live. My immediate environment might not be reflective of the general situation given most people around here are young and liberal-minded.

 

The media is becoming more diverse in many ways and I've started noticing more same-sex couples in film and tv. The guy that owned that little shop in Frozon ("Yoohoo, big summer blowout!") is canonically gay - it showed his husband/bf/SO with their kids and was also confirmed by someone who worked on the movie.

As for the original question, heteronormativity affected me a fair bit in the whole "realising my sexuality" thing. Here in NI, specifically a more rural part of it where I live, it is very taboo and people generally didnt talk about it. Still don't, to some degree. When I was little nobody ever told me about homosexuality or bisexuality or anything LGBT. I didnt really know about any of it for ages. Then when it was talked about, it was always in hushed tones on the school playground (we'd have been about 8 or 9) and it was treated like a bad word by the kids. My parents never explained any of it to me. My dad did his best to plant the ides that it was bad though in my head. For example, if we were watching tv and a gay couple were on it, he would insult them and say it was disgusting or unnatural. Thankfully, my mother is far more accepting of people and supports the LGBT community and I ended up not adopting my dad's homophobic views.
I never had an interest in boys. Most of my friends were male and people kept asking if I fancied them so eventually I pretended that I did just so they would shut up. I figured that I would sort of "grow into" liking boys but I never did and I thought I was just strange because I had never been taught about LGBT stuff and everyone assumes everyone else is straight so I didnt know any different.
Then I joined tumblr when I was 13. I learnt a lot of things about different sexualities and gender identities and it made me even more accepting and able to talk about these things more openly. It took away that taboo and stigma from it for me. I didnt realise I was gay for another three years but I think that if it weren't such a taboo and stigmatized subject over here and if I was exposed to more of it in my childhood then I'd have figured things out sooner.

 

I think the stereotype is still very much there amongst people, but it crumbles quickly when questioned and probed.

I myself wish I'd inherited this mythic gay dress sense. I typically buy stuff thinking "that looks nice" then either never wear it because I later realise how unflattering it is or wear it and look a mess anyway. Every pair of jeans I own seems to end up screaming "Dad jeans"!

By contrast a large number of straight guy (particularly guys under 25-30) look very "presented". Designer trainers (sneakers), designer jeans, beanies, and Beats headphones of course! It seems to be the new "status" - young men can no longer afford the fancy houses, and you can only show off a flash car in select oppurtunities so clothing and tech are walking indicators of how well you are doing (even if you are just a broke student!).

 

I think it makes it very hard for me to understand myself. I've been conditioned my whole life to see marriage as primarily between a man and a woman. When I think about myself in the future, I automatically picture me with a guy most of the time. Being confused about my sexuality, this complicates things because I think a big part of that is just what I've conditioned to see myself as. Even if I can be happy with a girl in the future, it's hard for me to test things in that way because of how society has changed my mindset.

I think finding yourself is hard when you're taught that it's only supposed to be a certain way.

Also the whole "well who's the guy and who's the girl in the relationship thing" I think this is really annoying, but it also has an impact on LGBt+ people a bit too I think, when you're raised with that mindset. Sometimes in relationships, there's a more dominant and more submissive person, but that goes both ways, and obviously those shouldn't be qualifiers for "manliness" and "femininity" respectively. It's just one more way to put people in boxes. I think that also plays into the whole top/bottom culture and how for some gay men, from what I here, it's considered shameful to be a bottom because that's more "feminine". I know that's more of a masculinity issue than a heteronormative one, but just in general different traits, different genders, shouldn't be looked down upon.

 

My biology teacher does this thing sometimes where she picks on someone that's texting at the end of class, asking them if it's a same sex or opposite sex person that they're texting with - the implication being that if it's same sex you're just friends. I always worry that she'll ask me one day and I'll say same sex, and she'll just move on to someone else, but I want her... I want her to understand that my same-sex relationship matters? I'd want to be like "wait, no, it's different! Don't I get my little moment here?" I dunno, it's just something weird I used to think about a lot.
This entire thread is super-charged with experiences and emotions though, eh? Heheh... Whenever I'd question my sexuality as a kid, or say something weird (i.e., being at slumber party full of girls and suggesting we play 7 minutes in heaven *CRINGE*), I'd always think "Well you can't be gay, because you like boys!!". On top of that, I grew up in a pretty small town, and although I thought I knew more than most about the LGBT community, I didn't really understand bisexuality until well into my freshman year of highschool. So... It was hard for me to feel valid, or to find a place I felt comfortable in. Although I suppose that struggle is why we're all here.

 

I know it's just a cultural habit but it irritates me when I hear people speaking to children and reinforcing heterosexual expectations even if they don't really care if their kids aren't straight.
Things like 'have you got a girlfriend at school then now' and 'you must have been kissing girls'. It seems harmless but it definitely sends a message to the child that says being straight is being normal.

 

I grew up having crushes on boys, and I even went out with a guy for a while and then felt heartbroken when it ended. After that, I developed strong feelings for a woman and had a really hard time understanding it. I told myself that she was the exception, and I was straight, and I'd never feel anything for another woman. Obviously, that wasn't true.

It took me a long time to understand why I had never questioned my sexuality. I knew about lesbians, and I felt grateful that I was born straight. Then I wondered if I had somehow made myself gay by overthinking things. I eventually came to the conclusion that I developed feelings for guys because I was brought up believing that's what I was supposed to do. It's incredible that society can have an influence that big. But here I am, at 20, with absolutely no desire to go out with a man.

But the way I used to think scares me. I even had a friend when I was 13 who ended up telling me that she was bisexual. Her confession scared me and I ended up avoiding her. It makes me so, so ashamed to think about now.

So yes, our hetero-normative culture has influenced my life GREATLY. It's the only explanation I have for how long it took me to even realize that I wanted to be with a woman.