Well hello. I’m a BYU student
hoping to major in something with enough science to get me into Medical School.
I grew up on the East Coast. My favorite food group is fruits. I’m a lesbian.
I’m a member of the BYU club USGA, the people there are amazing and cheer me up
every single week. I didn’t really accept my sexuality until I was 14. Even
after accepting it, I still sometimes fight it, try to fit the mold, lie just
enough to fit in. Before I accepted it, I tried dating a couple guys, in an
effort to feel whatever it is that straight girls feel. I ended up in some
really bad situations, and it was just making things worse. I have some awesome
guy friends, but I just can’t see them the way that I’m supposed to. I’ve dated
a few girls seriously, and the months that I’ve been in those relationships are
some of the best times of my life. I was also lucky that their families were
supportive and accepting.
There’s always been this big
romantic thing about love being blind. That we’re so advanced now, and instead
of arranged marriages we can be free to love someone who’s in a different
socioeconomic class, or has a different skin color. (Yet statistically speaking
if you get married at BYU it’s probably two middle class white Mormons). People
talk about love as if it’s some big Disney movie. The truth is my black friend
and his white wife can’t even run around the mall without people assuming he’s
some crazy black guy trying to rape the white chick. Yep, I read the National
Geographic and learned all about kids in arranged marriages. The point is, this
is usually graced over in our culture, and we focus on the happy loving couples
we see getting married in Temple Square or wherever.
So we keep hearing, from movies,
books, media, that love isn’t stopped by these things. Why then do we decide to
draw the line at gender? What is it about two girls dancing together that
signals the end of the world? Why is it that LGBTQ people feel so confused and
scared that they shut themselves up in closets to avoid the persecution and the
confrontations? There’s a lot that I don’t understand about the way people
react to homosexuality. It’s just another thing that the LDS church, and much
of society, has slid into that box marked ‘taboo’.
During my time working at a
volunteer fire department, I made friends with a gay firefighter. One day there
was a blood drive at our station. It was my first time giving blood. I was all
bubbly, chatting with the people in the blood drive bus, and taking advantage
of all the free juice and cookies. But there was something that really killed
my groove. In the middle of all the personal questions you’re asked before you
can donate blood, there’s something that sticks out like a thorn. Practicing
gay men aren’t allowed to donate blood.
I sat there, watching my blood drip
into a plastic bag, knowing I was doing a service, while my friend sat inside
the fire station. He’s donated countless hours of service, responding to more
911 calls and putting in just as many long nights as I have. He deserves that
right to serve people. Sure, there’s a higher chance that he’s got some kind of
STD, and the blood bank can’t afford to spend time on someone who’s a high risk
group for something like HIV. I understand that it’s not really discrimination.
It’s just statistics and rational judgment. But it hurts. It hurts to know that
I could sit in there, little miss perfect, getting my blood drawn to save
lives, despite being a practicing lesbian. And yet my friend didn’t have that
luxury.
There ya go, I just spilled a few
beans that I usually keep all locked up. A little bit of the chaos in my life,
typed up on a Microsoft Word page when I really should be going through my
textbooks. Forgive the broken speech, run-on sentences, and grammatical errors.
Hopefully this mess does you as much good as it does me. Aaand here’s a little
something from my favorite poet. I figure if I tack that on to the end of this
rambling post, at least there’ll be something on the page worth looking at J
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aZg0ZCYDnaY
~Rose~
I was going to write about not being able to participate in my work's blood drive this week. But, you beat me to it! Seems like great minds think alike. Thanks for your post and best of look on all of your upcoming adventures!
ReplyDeleteI hate the lines we put on gender. I figure if you're a good person then what does it matter if you are a boy or girl or somewhere in between?
ReplyDeleteAnyway you should keep posting around here :) Good to hear your point of view.
What I really want to know is why do we, as members of the LGBT community, still buy into the stupid things that straight society has fed to us? For instance, you said, "Sure, there’s a higher chance that he’s got some kind of STD, and the blood bank can’t afford to spend time on someone who’s a high risk group for something like HIV." Why do you think that your male counterpart has a higher chance of getting STDs or having HIV?? I bet that more straight people have HIV than do the gay ones--and what do we do about prohibiting THEM from donating blood? Why is a sexually active gay male more likely to have some bloodborne disease than a sexually active gay female--or sexually active straight males and females?
ReplyDeleteThis is something that needs to change. Sexually active gay men are no more likely to have sexually transmitted diseases than are anyone else and we, as a society, need to stop putting people into those boxes.
Also, where did you do volunteer firefighting??? I really want to get into that. :)
Thanks for writing!