the-queer-observer

[the-queer-observer]

Well, hi peoples, aliens, zombies, vampires and others

The bi phase that is pretty much real: but it has NOTHING to do with bisexuality

-observed by me... on me and one more subject.

I don’t think I will ever write a post without talking shit about the society and the culture, but hey, that’s why we are here.

So, as my “clickbait” title suggests, I am gonna talk about the “bi phase”. Except I am not: I identify as a queer, which I prefer to lesbian, even though I am only explicitly attracted to girls. That’s another cultural thing, that I will perhaps talk about later, but not now. However, I did identify as bi in the past and it was because I was confused. But not by my feelings: I was right about what I felt. What I wasn’t right about, was identifying the feelings you told me meant something, as the actual something they were.

Sounds difficult. Might be just my English tho.

Now, let me elaborate. I can’t remember the first time I was asked whether I have a boyfriend, whether I had a crush, whether I liked a boy in our class... I sincerely can’t remember. I can remember the question being asked when I was six, on the first day of school. I also remember my friends in kindergarten getting “married.” And there is nothing inherently wrong with that: not in their case- to my knowledge, they both to this day identify as straight, so this... this might be pretty much the reality for them. It’s questionable, yeah. But if we use pansexuality as the assumption (instead of straight, that we use now) and then let everyone specify their attraction and preferences, I don’t see a problem with two kids, pretending to have a wedding. He was told to like girls, she was told to like boys and they actually do, so it fits for them and that’s great.

But I was told to like boys, so I automatically started assuming my platonic feelings were actually romantic.

I thought: He is a boy, he is nice, he looks good, I want to be friends with him... I must have a crush on him. Well, turned out I actually just wanted to be friends. I remember that feeling from my 6th grade (I was about 11-12 at that time). There was a boy, he had a crush on me. It took me so fooking long to understand why I couldn’t like him back. I thought he just isn’t the one, but then, I did like him as a friend... blah, blah, blah, yady yady yada...

Not for a single moment I thought: well, perhaps the problem is, I am just not attracted to boys. And I am not. That’s literally what the problem was, but while I had some basic knowledge about the LGBTQIA+ community, it was mostly just to cover the meanings of the slurs my friends used and that one or two adult gay people my parents knew and I never thought that I might be a part of the community, because everyone always told me I was straight. Everyone assumed I was straight. It was almost like they knew that for a fact.

I was told I’d meet a boy I would like eventually... So I kept searching... And I found a few girls I did, in fact, fancy. “Okay,” I thought, “I can date girls until I find the right guy, then I’ll just get married and I will have children and yady yady yada.” I thought.

“I am bi and perhaps.... I prefer girls.” That’s what I came up with. And that’s what I came out with to my parents and the closest of my friends. The first time I did so was in my 8th grade (13-14). Now, I did realize I liked boys and girls in different ways. That’s actually true.

But there is this thing: there is a definition of bisexuality, that says something along: “not necessarily in the same way” etc. So I assumed my platonic, I-wanna-be-friends, that I felt to boys, were just a different type of romantic feelings.

It took me another year or so to figure out that’s not actually true. It took a lot of questioning and searching and even a straight date, that I didn’t even know was a date, until I was told it was after like...2 hours in. It also took all the courage to overcome the hatred for the word “lesbian” that is almost only used in so homophobic ways, we don’t even have a slur for that. It’s its own slur. And that was the word that fit. But I hated it did and to this day, I prefer queer.

But I am not angry about how long it took.

I am unbelievably mad, that it’s a thing.

Because there are actually bi people.

They are beautiful.

They are absolutely valid.

They are great.

They are real.

And they are fooking tired of the bs, that is associated with them, even though it has nothing to do with them.

If someone tells you that they are bi, the chances are:

1) They are bi.

2) They really really think they are bi.

So, in the conclusion: The “bi phase” is- in my opinion and experience- a real thing, caused by heteronormative society, teaching explicitly gay people (I think I could say it’s mostly women), that they are straight, when they are not.

It has nothing to do with actually bi people and I wished y’all would understand.

[the-queer-observer]

Well, hi peoples, aliens, zombies, vampires and others, I am indeed back (after a month)

We just love different: my take on a post I found

So here it goes:

Due to the lack of representation of people like me in the media, I developed a unique way to express my feelings.

By dumb gestures like agressive waving (when I see her in the halls), drawing dinosaurs in the colors of our hair (Seriously guys, are you even in love if you never drew a pink T-Rex for your significant other???) or sketching a rocket to yeet nightmares to the moon (because she build a rocket from legos to yeet a cold to the outer space a few months earlier). But also by a little more sophisticated ways, like buying a coffee thirty minutes before her lessons even end and then being surprised it’s fooking cold.

Those are the small things- small things many people probably wouldn’t care about. That doesn’t mean we don’t hold hands and hug and cuddle and kiss and make out... We do. We haven’t always tho: especially in the first month or so, we would only sometimes hold hands in public- that’d be it. Because guess what? Our little European town is conservative. Basically, that’s just about it.

The thing is: there is this girl who’s been making fun of us the whoooole time. She is pansexual and I don’t think she actually means any harm. I am not here to talk shit about her. No. I just feel like she perhaps doesn’t really understand.

She has something we jokingly call the “Madame Bovary syndrome”: she’s seen and read so many romantic stories, she struggles to see why the real ones don’t work that way. For her, it’s difficult to understand that we are dating, because we don’t act like a couple from her stories. Except those stories are not about us. They aren’t even for us. They don’t fit us just because we don’t know them. They don’t fit, because they aren’t about two teenage punks in a conservative little town, because they aren’t for people like us and they were never actually meant to be. We don’t fit the narrative: I don’t think we even want to and I don’t think we even should. We are who we are. We love the way we fooking do- get over it. She hasn’t yet. I don’t think she will ever read this, but I want y’all to stop and think about this. You might be on either side of the story, you might be on neither or both, that I don’t know. You might have never thought about this: I wouldn’t. I would have never figured out, if I didn’t find this.

So read this.

Share this.

We were never actually thought to love or we were thought to love in a wrong way. Love is not love, not always. It’s different. Holding hands means something else. Kissing on a street means something else. I am not saying one is better than the other. They are equal, but they aren’t the same. The way we express our feelings is valid and it matters. It’s important to know that we can love differently, but just as deeply. We can love silently. We can love loudly, whatever feels right. It’s only about the people involved in the relationship.

But hey, most importantly: LOVE SAFELY. Happy pride month, y’all.

[the-queer-observer]

The TOXICITY of straight dating culture: Do you even realize what you teach?

A few months ago, a straight teenage girl explained her crush to me with the sentence “He’s so toxic.”

I know a 17-year-old girl with a little to no clue of how a non-toxic relationship should look like.

I started noticing a certain pattern online and in my real life too.

Now it’s a time for my first disclaimer: I am not straight myself. Nope. Not at all. Perhaps that’s why I see through it.

To this point, all I have done about this is that I have complained to some friends, got over it and went on with my life.

Today, a girl, no older than twelve, has told me about her crush on a “bad boy” and we talked about him for a second. He really did seem like what the definition of a bad boy is for tweens.

I snapped.

And here I am, writing my first tumblr post ever on this very topic.

I want to make clear, this is not an attack on those girls. This is an attack on the society, what it taught them and what it failed to teach.

The youngest girl and me, we talked about music. She said she liked “dramatic” songs and played me some of her favorites.

Disclaimer number two: I did know both the artists, but I don’t actually listen to them. The closest to mainstream music my playlists get is Take me to church by Hozier, the rest being a wide range of songs, interprets and genres from pop punk to death metal and everything in between.

I was actually surprised. One of the two artists she played for me was Billie Eilish. The beginning of the song went:

Don't be cautious, don't be kind

You committed, I'm your crime

Push my button anytime

You got your finger on the trigger

But your trigger finger's mine

The second song was by Maroon 5.

It was even worse:

So what you trying to do to me

It's like we can't stop, we're enemies

But we get along when I'm inside you, eh

You're like a drug that's killing me

I cut you out entirely

But I get so high when I'm inside you

Yeah you can start over you can run free

You can find other fish in the sea

You can pretend it's meant to be

But you can't stay away from me

I can still hear you making that sound

Taking me down rolling on the ground

You can pretend that it was me

But no, oh

I am not going to argue about whether it’s appropriate or whether she understands the lyrics the way I do. It doesn’t even matter. She understands the drama in the song. She understands it enough for me to be concerned.

There are other songs like that. There is a whole culture teaching pre-teen and teenage girls, that “they can’t get away”, romanticizing toxic people and toxic relationships, blurring the lines of consent and guess what? The girls believe it’s the way it’s supposed to be.

I texted my girlfriend and we spent some time looking for straight love-songs, celebrating healthy relationships. None of them were mainstream, but we found things like:

That the world is ugly

But you're beautiful to me

Are you thinking of me

Like I'm thinking of you

I would say I'm sorry, though

Though I really need to go

I just wanted you to know

I wanted you to know

I wanted you to know

I'm thinking of you every night, every day

(My Chemical romance)

And

Desperate for changing

Starving for truth

I'm closer to where I started

I'm chasing after you

I'm falling even more in love with you

Letting go of all I've held on to

I'm standing here until you make me move

I'm hanging by a moment here with you

Forgetting all I'm lacking

Completely incomplete

I'll take your invitation

You take all of me now

(Lifehouse)

First of all: Those are 4 extracts of songs, chosen by me to demonstrate my point and they may or may not reflect the reality, you (the reader) see: those two songs might be just an exception, but in that case this post is still not canceled, because there is enough of other correlations and causation for me to have a reason to write this.

Those songs are “dramatic”, but the drama shifts from the relationship itself and its toxicity to the circumstances and environment. My girlfriend even recommended a punk song called Ne touche pas moi (Do not touch me), which is entirely about consent.

I am not explicitly saying that the songs she played for me are bad. It’s not for me to decide.

But all Billie Eilish’ fans I ever met were in the age range between eleven and fourteen, so I am supposing that’s her target audience. As for Maroon 5, I have no idea. However, music influences us. The girl is old enough to know what kind of music she likes and wants to listen to and with the peer pressure going on there, her parents do not really have a say in what she listens to and they are not to be blamed for this.

It’s the culture.

Toxicity is not a positive trait to look for in a potential partner. Even if he is a good looking one.

Enough of music.

Do you know who the toxic crush was?

Draco Malfoy.

One of the most famous of all characters in media, famously portrayed by Tom Felton in the Harry Potter film series.

Disclaimer number four: I have a problem with the books and movies and I also have some issues with the author.

Still, I see a fandom celebrating the love of Severus Snape for Lilly Evans Potter. Except it’s not love and it’s not a crush either. It’s an obsession. One that has become so iconic, the word “Always” is one of the main symbols of Harry Potter.

It shouldn’t be.

It should have never happened.

Draco Malfoy is quite the same thing. He is a racist, a bully. He is raised to be one, sure... That’s not an excuse. He doesn’t actually have a canonical redemption arch (not counting the deleted scene from the last movie and the Cursed child). If he came up to Hermione, acknowledging his mistakes, apologizing for his behavior, then maybe. Perhaps... That’s another story though. My point is, Rowling fails to actually depict problematic characters as actually problematic, they are romanticized by her, the filmmakers, the fandom and the wider audience.

Girls are taught to be the ones to make the redemption arch happen, irl or in fiction. They are supposed to date whoever is into them, regardless of whether they like the person back, and it’s unbelievably often I see them crushing on villains and problematic people like Draco Malfoy, because they are taught, he would change for them or that they could change him.

Toxicity is not a positive trait to look for in a potential partner. Even if he is a good looking one.

Those together result in a complete lack of knowledge of how a healthy relationship should look like. That’s the case of the third girl I mentioned. Being best friends with both her and her current boyfriend, I had three points of view on their relationship. It’s only been the past few weeks, not more than two month it has shifted to a more positive, healthy relationship.

It’s not the girl’s fault. They learn what a healthy relationship is the hard way, mostly after going through a toxic one(s).

WHY?

The sentence: “I always fall for the bad guys.” lacks the essential: “because the society taught me to” part.

It’s so common.

It’s too common.

It’s not even that we wouldn’t talk about it: we do. But you celebrate it. And that is not okay and that is the reason I am typing this.

Disclaimer number 5: The gender roles in this post are based off of my observations. I do acknowledge the fact that girls can be and sometimes are the toxic person in the relationship and that the lesson boys are thought is no way better (more freeing perhaps, but not right either) . It might not be specific to the straight culture either, but again, my observations were.

I was about thirteen, when I figured out I was gay and I had to learn everything on my own. How the relationships should work out, what is healthy and what is not... I had to learn on my own because the society failed to teach me anything. I am yet to decide whether that’s better or worse than teaching the wrong one.