Who put us in the closet?

:roflmao:

Society for sure. Off-handed comments from well-meaning people over the years. Praise for acting a certain way. But ultimately our own human nature put us there: a human nature that would do just about anything to be accepted and would rather conform than stand out.

 

Does it matter? Why waste time on it? Get out of closet.

 

For me it was my Catholic upbringing and fear. I was worried about being different, being wrong, not following these "rules" society had laid our for me (or that my parents had ingrained in me). I just wanted to be the "good" girl, the rule follower and did so but apparently it was at the expense of my own happiness.

 

To those of us who are finally and fully out, no, it doesn't really matter, except as a form of storytelling, of sharing our experiences with others. (But even that still has value as simple human expression.)

But for the rest of the many thousands here on EC still grappling with how to deal with their sexuality, it does matter, and it matters a lot.

 

That's what really burns me. There are self-actualized bi/lesbian women out there functioning in our society that grew up with the same general upbringing as me. But for some reason I HAD to get married. I knew back then I liked girls but didn't give it much weight.

Girl, you're gonna carry that weight a long time.

Maybe it was my parents saying gay people can exist as long as they don't have sex with other gay people. At the time it seemed so generous of them, like they were being inclusive and not judgmental.

Maybe it's society sexualizing women to the point where I thought it was normal to think of girls in sexual terms, and thought every woman thought the same. But not every woman wants to make out with or feel up another woman, and that is still shocking to me.

Lots of reasons. Either way I'm at least aware of the closet around me now, that is the first step. I think for me, figuring out who put me there or how I got there is crucial to the process of getting out of it.

 

For me, it was a growing realisation that I felt different - not really knowing what that was, but being a bit kooky as I was growing up and being told I was more like a girl in the way I behaved. I grew up with loads of girls in my neighbourhood and very few boys, so it was just natural that I played with them. I didn't think for a second that I felt more comfortable with them, but I clearly did as I didn't go out of my way to find male friends as a young child.

Being singled out for being different makes you want to reduce the difference that you show, so you quickly adapt to fit what you think is expected from you around behaviour, speech, mannerisms. As you grow older you conform to what is expected from an adult male and it just becomes 'normal' behaviour and you train yourself to fit in.

It then starts to strike you what it all means the anti-gay rhetoric in the press, the whole 80s hysteria around AIDS, right wing views on homosexuality, the perceived 'shame' in being different and 'the only gay in the village' if you were 'identifier' as such.

I get angry at myself for not acting sooner than I did but that's just circumstance. The closet is now well and truly dismantled and chopped up for firewood!

 

I'm guessing when you (first) heard this, you may not have yet realized the importance of sex in many people's lives.

They don't? Damn!