#comp het

[hypoclericalcunt]

Comp het and internalised homophobia is very real. I knew that people could be gay, i had many queer friends, i would always think of myself as an ally, I always thought women were hot, it was always i support gay people, people can be gay, women are hot, but IM not gay. Definitely. Very straight. This is why I sympathise with Mike so much, I am so fucking gay, and it's not even the 80s so there's not as much homophobia as there used to be. My own friends had randomly asked me if I was gay I was like WHAT ? NO ! i used to have a MASSIVE crush on a friend of mine and she herself was bi and STILL i thought I was straight. lt feels so good to be true to myself and stop pushing that part of me away, I live in a conservative place with a conservative family, but my brother is a huge liberal, and STILL i felt unsafe. I knew about byler, I knew about MIKE'S comp het plot, and STILL I was like, he's gay, but IM not. No way.

Anyway I made this post because Mike's storyline means so much to me and to so many others. This is another reason why byler becoming canon would be huge and help SO many people.

[justgivemeabookplease]

Shrek 2, while a cinematic masterpiece, is also an interesting look at queerness and comp het.

Fiona is married so it's time to reunite with her parents. But instead of marrying a prince, she's married to an ogre. Not just that, but she's also an ogre. (Yes everyone knew she would sometimes be an ogre but that was when she was a child, she didn't know she would be an ogre for the rest of her life, and besides once she met the right prince she would stop being an ogre. She was supposed to stop being an ogre.)

But okay they're both ogres. We can still ask about when they'll have children because even if they're ogres they can still have kids, right? That's what married princes and princesses do so naturally that's what everyone does. Even if ogres might not be great parents (I've heard that ogres eat their young, is that something you people do?) it's still something that should be discussed.

And okay you can stay in Fiona's childhood bedroom filled with all the reminders that hey, everyone thought she was just a princess and princesses marry princes. Her toys left out from the last time she played with them. The prince slays the ogre. The princess offers a token of gratitude for slaying the ogre. Fiona wrote Mrs. Fiona Charming a million times in her diary because what else was she supposed to grow up to be?

And Harold you have to fix this, your country can't be ruled by ogres. You were unfit to rule when you were a frog but I changed you, I made you better, I made you a prince. You know how this works. Think of your daughter's safety.

Shrek goes to the Fairy Godmother and oh honey, ogres don't live happily ever after. It's just not done. It hasn't happened in all of fairy tale history. You have to change the both of you to be happy. You have to present as a prince and a princess. It will be better. You'll fit in better that way. You'll be accepted that way.

[aceing-on-the-cake]

Compulsory Heterosexuality Info Dump

So because a friend of mine didn't know what comp het was and their internet history is monitored by their parents so they can't just use google, I'm doing a very quick research dive and giving you guys the results in case there are others out there who are in the same situation. I'll also be tagging blogs bigger than me because again, there might be fellow queers out their who are in the same boat as my friend and I want them to have access to this information.

So what is compulsory heterosexuality (or comp het)?

Comp het is in essence the societal belief and enforcement of being straight.

What does this mean?

In basic form it means that the only options presented to everyone, from the moment of birth, is that of a cis, amatonormative, heterosexual lifestyle.

You are given two gender options, these gender options determine the two roles you're allowed to fulfill, husband and wife, and you are told that these two roles are what will make you happy and are what you are supposed to strive for.

Meaning society, if you are born AFAB, tells you you're going to one day get married, it's going to be a boy, and this is what will make you happy. Almost everything in life is then seen through this lens. How attractive your are, how you are supposed to talk, how you're supposed to behave, etc is all considered through the lens of if a man will be attracted to you.

On the flip side, if you are born AMAB society tells you there are roles you have to fulfill as well. You are told you will one day want a wife, that you have to be able to have a job to provide for her, that you have to behave in a certain emotional way to be strong for her, that if the things you like are too feminine well then you're gay or a girl which is a problem because at the end of the day you're supposed to want the girl-fiance-wife.

This literally just sounds like the patriarchy.

Yes, it does, because it's caused by it. Nowadays people commonly know about compulsory heterosexuality from the Lesbian Masterdoc, but the term actually originated by Adrienne Rich in 1980.

Adrienne Rich in her article Compulsory Heterosexuality and Lesbian Existence put forward three ideas, 1) that heterosexuality and lesbianism were institutions themselves/possible political ideologies, 2) that heterosexuality as a system if not constantly maintained and upheld would eventually crumble and 3) that heterosexuality as a system could be opted out of and actively fought against whether or not you were actually attracted to women/non-women.

This is very different from the way we currently think of and define those terms, I am aware of that, but her point does still stand to some degrees that comp het, cisnormativity and amatonormativity all crumble when we stop rigidly enforcing the structures that uphold them, i.e., the patriarchy, misogyny, classism, and racism.

Ok but like what does that actually look like?

It can look like a lot of things, for a lot of different people. In the Lesbian Masterdoc you see comp het presented from a straightforward lesbian lens (of a 19 year old figuring out and defining their own sexuality guys, I'm not gonna sit here and critique it and rip it to death, go do that somewhere else).

This is therefore presented through things like women/non-women who were raised/socialized as women possibly having crushes on men, but they're always unattainable in some way (celebrities, fictional, someone real but they wouldn't actually ever be able to truly be in a relationship with, etc). It might also show up for lesbians as liking the idea of a man but being uncomfortable when one actually wants to move forward in the process. Or even sometimes it might show up as sexual fantasies with men but they're faceless, they're more an idea, or you're actually viewing another woman sleeping with him.

This presentation of comp het has made a lot of bi/pan/mspec people uncomfortable because they feel they too have experiencing comp het and when reading the Lesbian Masterdoc it's presented as if experiencing this is a straight shot towards being a lesbian.

And they're right that comp het isn't experienced by just lesbians. For mspecs who present feminine/as women this could be in the feeling that they have to dress a certain way to be presentable, but presentable is based on appealing to men. This can mean something as simple as women are expected to wear makeup, always, regardless of if they're looking to seek men's attention or not, because that's the base standard.

For mspecs who present masculine this can look like the inability to express themselves in an overly emotional manner because that doesn't make them "strong" and if they're not "strong" then they won't attract women, and that's what they're supposed to be doing.

For mspecs in general that can look like their queer looking relationships to be seen as a phase even if their mspec-ness is respected because of course they're eventually going to get married to a man/woman.

This can affect polyamorous cishet people in that they're seen as doing heterosexuality wrong because you're supposed to have the one partner and the 2.5 kids.

This can affect aspecs because they're told they'll never truly feel fulfilled if they don't have that boyfriend/girlfriend/partner to love them in a way that's so special nothing else could match up.

This affects all of us guys is my point.

How is this helpful to me?

Well for sapphics and lesbians (or sapphics/mspecs confused on if they are actually lesbians) this can be a helpful concept to consider because it can help you determine what relationships you truly want to pursue, which is the main point I feel is to be gained from the Lesbian Masterdoc. As she's put it "it's way more important to ask yourself if you can be truthfully happy with a man than if you’re attracted to them"

So if you're a sapphic who experiences attraction to men but you honestly can't ever see yourself willingly entering into a relationship with them, consider the idea of comp het.

If you're Achillean the opposite of this can be true, if you've been attracted to women before but honestly can't ever see yourself willingly entering into a relationship with them, consider whether comp het is working on you.

For mspecs this can be a helpful term to throw over the table back at your parents when they ask when you're going to get a "real relationship".

This can be a helpful term to consider when asking "am I forcing myself to wear mascara because I feel this is the only way I look presentable or do I actually like mascara."

Or it can be a helpful concept to look back on when undermining our internalized ideals of misogyny, towards ourselves and others.

This is a helpful term to put in our tool boxes to talk about the harm the systems of patriarchy, classism, and racism impose upon us.

Comp het can help us to understand why so many people look down on polyamory as a legitimate way of life.

It can be a helpful term for aspecs who are trying to figure out if they really want to date/have sex, or if they just believe these are the only things that will make you happy.

In general

Compulsory heterosexuality is just another term to describe a system we are all intimately familiar with. But by giving us the words to describe our experiences, it gives us the power to communicate those experiences more effectively, and to possibly understand why we're experiencing them.

This is just a bare basic knowledge post.

Honestly if you have the ability to, as in your internet history is not monitored in the way my friend's is, I encourage you to go on the deep dive through the sources listed below. Many of them are honestly only 30 pages long, that's a relatively short read, and understanding queer theory like this not only helps you to understand your own identity, but the ways in which you are connected to the rest of the fellow queer community.

Sources

Lesbian Masterdoc

Queer Theory 101: Compulsory Heterosexuality

Compulsory Heterosexuality and Lesbian Existence

Normativities Defined

Taglist

I'm tagging blogs bigger than me so that this has an easier time getting passed around as I mainly talk about aspec issues because I am aspec, but as stated above, I wanted to make sure that queer people who's internet histories are monitored and are only able to find information through tumblr safely could do so.

@our-queer-experience @our-sapphic-experience @our-lesbian-experience @our-aspec-experience @our-polyamorous-experience @our-pansexual-experience @our-unlabelled-experience @our-aroace-experience @our-mspec-experience @our-questioning-experience @our-bisexual-experience

[ramblingsfromthytruly]

no #1 piper mclean defender here going on a rant !!!

sooo jumping right into it :) her being all "i'm not a stereotypical feminine girl" kinda makes sense considering she's native american and ppl constantly sexualise girls of their culture. also the only female role models she would have had growing up would be women in the film industry and they aren't exactly NOT sexualised by public eyes. her first hand experiences with femininity have always been associated with inferiority and shallowness and surface level beauty.

also even if rick didn't intend for her to be queer from the start, she was VERY comphet lesbian coded. the way she always thought about jason was very reminiscent of when i was young and trying to convince myself i had a crush on this guy. also jason & piper's memories together were literally FAKED by hera. ppl talk about that when expressing admiration for jason but conveniently forget about it when it comes to piper like really?? and did i forget the daddy issues me & piper both share????

that girl had SEVERE insecurities about being incompetent (again, complicated relationship with femininity.. also among the 7) despite probably being the one who's single-handedly saved them from troubles the most number of times out of all the 7.

[modernrifle]

no because this section of rots is literally insane??

like, in the first line, about padmé, the emphasis is placed on the word 'could', highlighting how devastating the act of someone close to him maybe betraying him was. it isn't particularly personal: it isn't about padmé, or their love, or even really anything aside from the action of cheating itself. he's hurt that someone in general was willing to inflict such pain on him. additionally, anakin's love for padmé is not love so much as it is a need for someone to protect, someone to whom he can prove himself worthy for, a person who he deems controllable, possessable. it's the betrayal itself that's tearing him apart, not padme, not her, but it, the action.

but then, when addressing obi-wan's place, the emphasis is placed on 'him'. it's not the fact that it happened, it's not the fact that obi-wan might have had the audacity to do it, it's the fact that it is obi-wan. it somehow seems more personal in the novel when anakin is addressing obi-wan, because it is not the loss of some symbolic person he told himself to love and protect that betrayed him, it's his brother, his mother, his best friend, his teacher, a person who is more than an idea to him, that hurt him.

so, basically, when it's padmè, anakin seems more hurt by the fact it happened, that the representation of his ability to protect and control hurt him, but when it's obi-wan, anakin cares less about the act itself and more about the person - obi-wan. it just is written to seem so much more personal, because anyone could do what padmé did, but only he could do it in a way that truly affected anakin on a deeper, more singular level.

[moreover-clover]

Me: *sighs*

Also me: *changes tumblr bios from "bi disaster" to "lesbian disaster" apparently*

[dykeiism]

the current wave of comphet discourse is really getting me down because it seems like a total misunderstanding of why lesbians might consent to having sex with men. if i may be so bold as to post about my own experiences and risk being called a bisexual...

my attraction to women feels good. i have fantasies about touching and being touched by specific individual women. i like to imagine myself with one woman in particular and i feel comforted and pleasured by the idea of her hands on my body and of mine on hers. when we actually do have sex, it comes naturally to me. my arousal is exciting to me, and i feel satisfied and respected and safe after the encounter. i feel proud of what i did and i regard it as a good experience.

i seek out sex with men despite calling myself a lesbian. i don't believe that the sex i have with men tarnishes my integrity as a lesbian, and here's why: i'm a sex addict and i use sex as a method of self harm. when i have sex with men, they are random anonymous men. they could be anyone at all, and i'm not attracted to them in the slightest. my thought process is usually either "i'm worthless as a person unless i'm having sex. i need someone to use me the way i was born to be used, or else my life has no meaning and i should die" or "i need someone to hold me. i don't care who, and i don't care what i need to do to make it happen. i just need to be held." i panic and i dissociate and i try to stop myself from soliciting sex from men, but i feel like i'm watching myself from the outside. i feel terrified, ashamed, empty, and alone, and i regard it as a traumatic event. i'll never feel satisfied by the experience, so i seek it out again and again, trying to either hurt myself or to gain some kind of control over the situation. this isn't attraction; it's a horrifying combination of impulsivity, hypersexuality, mania, self-harming and suicidal urges, and severe dissociation. these are not things i should ever be acting on, if i can help it.

consenting to sex with men, even if i'm the one actively seeking out that sex, doesn't make me a bisexual. being told that what i feel towards men is 'attraction' is a complete misunderstanding of my experience and of attraction itself -- and it's a dangerous idea to spread. attraction shouldn't make you dissociate and panic. it shouldn't make you feel unsafe. feeling this way about men doesn't mean you're attracted to them; it probably just means that you have some psychological issues that you gotta work through.

[artbylittlebug]

I have a YouTube btw...! I just started a series where I will be reading my entire memoir, part 1 posted today!

[immabitqueer]

Re-reading The Lost Hero and, may I just say, Leo "comp-het" Valdez

[tortoiseguy]

"Farcille is such a fun ship that's so well written! It sucks it's not canon though"

THEY LITERALLY MIRROR ORPHEUS AND EURYDICE'S STORY AS ONE OF THE MOST ICONIC AND SAPHIC CODED AS FUCK TRAGEDYS IN GREEK MYTHOLOGY

SHE USES HER OWN GOD DAMN BLOOD RUN THROUGH HER OTHERWISE PERFECT DONE UP AND CLEAN HAIR TO QUITE LITERALLY BIRTH FALIN FROM THE DRAGONS CORPSE USING FORBIDDEN MAGIC AFTER LITERALLY PAIN STAKINGLY PIECING TOGETHER FALINS CORPSE BONE BY BONE

It is so insane to me how people try to argue farcille isn't technically canon when all the fucking text points to that being the case. There are thousands of straight stories with the exact same plot as farcille. We're either of them a man everyone in the world would be like "ya they're obviously romantic."

FUCKING people are out here tripping over themselves to write entire ass blog posts to explain how a single line of dialogue between marcille and laios is not romantic and actually very platonic. THERE IS LITERALLY ZERO EVIDENCE TO SUGGEST ANYTHING ROMANTIC BETWEEN THOSE TWO

Like idk man if an entire Fandom all basically collectively have the exact same reading of some charcaters it's sort of no longer a reading and becomes just how the author wrote it.

You're doing the thing! You're comp het-ing!!! Stop!!!!!!

[rising-above-stars]

this did wonders on tiktok

this was also my final assignment for a sociology paper

[liiasoul]

I always envy people who have their sexuality figured out. teach me your ways, how'd you do it pls I'm tired of not knowing

[ramblingsfromthytruly]

me, a closeted lesbian who only two people in my life know about but i'm too scared to ever bring up my sexuality:

me, a lesbian who has never actually had a relationship or even "crush" on another girl yet could never imagine herself with a guy:

me, a LESBIAN: what if i'm faking??? what if i'm actually straight and i'm faking for attention????

[meaningfall]

———

C. A. Singh • Comp Het

9-1-23

[jelestes]

you can never convince me olivia benson is straight because why is she always so miserable around these men? she’s always looking for a way out of these relationships and don’t give me the “it’s because she’s always been in love with stabler” crap bc how could obsessing over the POSSIBILITY of a twenty year old will they won’t type of situationship with a married man be the real reason she keeps dragging herself over and over into those goddamn awful relationships? look me in the eyes and tell this doesn’t scream text book compulsory heterosexuality to you? exactly.

[sherpafrankiefreddiesteviegeorge]

I'm having a quarter life crisis unpacking comp het. I Know I'm asexual and nonbinary. But I don't even know what romantic attraction is?! Where is the line between romance and platonic love? I want to cuddle, to feel close to another being, to watch sunrises but not "because that's what you're supposed to do" but because sunrises are calm and peaceful & I want to share that moment with someone or several someone's, to sit in silence and be without any expectations ruining it. I hate dating it feels so limiting and disingenuous with high expectations. My friendships are more fulfilling because I've only ever experienced dating as putting on a performance. I can not watch a Nicholas Sparks film without rolling my eyes or feeling insanely uncomfortable. I want to live in a house overflowing with love. The only crushes I've had have been on people who understood me, like 2 people ever, a trans boy and femme presenting girl. What am i?! Am I aromantic? Am I pansexual or panromantic?