Born This Way

While flipping through pages on the internet the other day (y’know, like the way one flips through pages in a book), I came across an article about choosing to be gay.  At first, I dismissed it as silly because of course you don’t choose to be gay, silly conservative person.  However, because I was curious or bored or because the next page of the internet looked stupid, I went back and actually read the article.  Turns out, “Queer by Choice, Not by Chance: Against Being ‘Born This Way’” is actually written by a queer woman claiming loud and proud that she has dated men and women and has chosen to be with women only.  Lindsay Miller, the author, goes on to explain that there are tons of awesome things about being queer (true), that a relationship between two women is automatically on equal footing (not true), and that regarding her attraction, both the mainstream movement and Lady Gaga are wrong: she was NOT born this way; she made a choice.  Three thoughts come to mind after reading this.  First, oh come on people, can we please leave Lady Gaga alone?  She wrote a song saying how she feels and lots of people liked it.  Do we claim that Bob Marley had the definitive stance on sheriff shooting?  No, so shut up.  Second, there are lots of interesting things about this article that could take up another entry, but look, the keen folks at Autostraddle already talked about that hooray.  Finally, Lindsay Miller, I totally hear what you’re saying and I respect it…for you.  I just disagree with it on a larger level.

The idea that people are “born this way” sometimes gets a bad rep, so let me just go on the record as saying that, well, some people really ARE just born this way.  I know I was.  How do I know I was?  Because I wanted to marry my second grade teacher.  Because when my first girlfriend kissed me for the first time I could feel it in places that weren’t just my lips.  Because my attraction to women has made me do stupid things like write songs and use the word “because” at the beginning of three sentences in a row (my attraction to men has done similar things, like caused me to temporarily take up “Magic: The Gathering”).  I don’t choose my feelings and I don’t control who I fall for (a point Miller actually states: no one chooses who they fall in love with).  Sure, I may choose how I react to that (telling my teacher I wanted to give her a Valentine, not stopping my girlfriend, following someone around like a puppy), but that’s just it: I’m choosing my reaction.  Sure, I could decide to only date men or only date women, but the attraction to both is already there and I didn’t do anything to make it happen.  If I didn’t already have that feeling there, it wouldn’t be an issue.  A few of those girls I have done stupid things for have been straight.  They all think I’m great and wonderful (their words, not mine) and don’t understand why I’m single, but none of them want to help with that.  Why?  Well, biologically, they aren’t attracted to women, and they’re choosing not to dick me around by pretending to be something they’re not.  None of us had a choice in who we’re attracted to.  Gay, straight, lesbian, bi, pan, it doesn’t matter.  We were ALL born this way.

Another thing I don’t quite understand is why is it bad to be born this way?  Not bad as in “being born queer is bad because being queer is bad”, but rather that saying we’re born this way is bad.  It’s somehow condescending.  “Oh, don’t blame little Jimmy for his love of men; he can’t help it.  He was born this way.”  Yes, I can see how Miller might have a point that people can be condescending with that.  Still, this is setting up a false dichotomy.  Either I’m born this way and should be pitied or I’m choosing this, so screw you?  No.  Just, no.  I AM born this way, but I’m not asking for you to feel bad for me.  I’m not asking for anyone to give me rights because they feel sorry for me.  I’m asking for rights because I’m a human being and deserve rights!  I was born black and a woman, too, yet no one goes out saying those are choices or that those should be pitied (and the folks that do say that have special words just for them!).  That just seems, well, ridiculous.  In my opinion, so does this.  I can be born queer and have it not be a choice and still be an upstanding human being who wants to be treated like everybody else.  I could actually LIKE being born like this.

Finally, I’m getting a little tired of all this hoopla about what being born queer means.  If I say this is just the way I am, I’m playing into some kind of rhetoric and justifying or not justifying things and blah.  Come on!  Why can’t it just simply be that I like men and I like women?  Even better, why can’t it just be that I like you?  Being rainbow can most certainly be a political thing, but by it’s very nature, no, it’s not.  Take away all the analysis and the politics and the people on soap boxes and what it comes down to is two people attracted to one another.  In some cases, that means that at least one of those people has an attraction to the same sex.  It’s just how they are.  It’s not a strategic move to make a point or go up against society or whatever.  It’s just a person being a person.  I don’t say I’m born this way because I want people to somehow view me a particular way; I do it because I once looked into a girl’s eyes and forgot what to say.  I do it because a boy held my hand and it made my heart skip a beat.  I do it because someday I want to find someone lovely who will have me and get married and have babies and live the life I imagined.  Why can’t that just be okay?

There are a lot of things that are just a part of who I am.  I’ve seen my baby pictures.  I had smudgy little brown eyes and a “I can’t believe you’re making me take a picture” scowl.  Turns out, I still have those same eyes and expression in pictures.  I have the same pale birthmark on my back.  Sure, the various scars and tattoo are new, but I basically have the same sandy skin.  I love these things about me.  I love that I’m right handed and can’t grip a pencil the proper way, I love that I have a strangely long tongue, I love that my hair turns colors in the sun.  I love that I ballroom dance, I love that I have very little shame, I love that I’m a drag king.  I love so many things about myself, both the things I choose and the things I just am, and I don’t feel any shame or remorse or belittling in saying that some of these things I didn’t have a say in.    My real choice is to find the peace and joy in how I came out.  I love men.  I love women.  I love how I was born.  You should, too.

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