I've been thinking about the action of "coming out" in general in relation to the fact that I have a lot of problems with social interaction. I've come out to a few people, and I've had people come out to me, and it never ceases to feel slightly awkward. So I have some questions for anybody who has come out or is considering doing so and feels like answering.
-If you've come out to people, how have they reacted? Did they react in a way you'd like them to react?
-If you haven't come out to someone, how would you like them to react?
-Is there an ideal way for people to react to coming out? Should allies react differently than people who share the identity as the out-comer? (>_< Word choice go boom.)
-Are the answers to the above questions different for coming out as different things? (e.g. would you like people to react differently to coming out as ace, trans, gay, etc?)
Sunday, December 20, 2009
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Eternal questions :-) You already have a good tool for coming out-- this blog. That's what I've done, just told people about my blog rather than sitting them down for a talk about asexuality. I think "hey, thanks for telling me" is the ideal response. The best responses I've gotten were probably "of course! sexuality is a spectrum!" and "there are a million ways to do sexuality and gender". I have a few things I could "come out" as and I think the process always feels pretty much the same.
ReplyDeleteI'm out as both gay (to everyone, I think) and asexual (to friends and certain siblings). Oddly enough though, I didn't really "come out" to any of them...at least not in the way people do in movies - big heartfelt/awkward scenes. The closest I can think is telling my friends I "might be bisexual" in grade nine. But after that everything just kind of flowed.
ReplyDeleteI think the best reaction would just be to have them BELIEVE me. My father is still in denial about the lesbian thing, but I can't even imagine trying to explain being asexual or gender queer to him. Not only would it be very awkward, but he has this idea that I'm out to join every minority group possible.
In my opinion, I'd be much more afraid/nervous to come out as genderqueer or trans. Gayness is mostly old news by now, since a lot of people have become more accepting. But its harder for people to accept things like transness or any non-binary gender.
With asexuality, I'd just be kind of worried about the questions they would ask me. And of course, them not "believing in asexuality".