‘Sexuality’ tends to be used as an all-encompassing term, with the expectation that our sexual attraction (i.e, who we are romantically and/or sexually attracted to) is always in line with our sexual identity (how we label ourselves- queer, gay, lesbian, bisexual, straight, etc), and sexual behavior (who we have sex with). However, this isn’t always the case, especially for members of the LGBTQ+ community where sexuality isn’t so black and white as ‘fall in love with who you are attracted to.’ This can be due to several reasons such as the prejudice that sexual minorities can so often face, either from society at large (remember that only 3.2% of people in the UK identify as LGBTQ+, and that it was only 10 years ago* that gay marriage was legalised in the UK), or even from themselves via internalised homophobia, something which can see people labeling and presenting their sexuality in a way that does not fit with who they actually are/their sexual orientation. Not because being gay is a choice and they are ‘choosing’ to be straight instead, but because acting on one’s sexuality is a choice and they are choosing not to act on it.
*When gay marriage was only legalised in the UK 10 years ago, in 2014, it’s irrefutable that we are a minority and that we do face prejudice for that. Before 2014, homosexual couples weren’t afforded the same rights as heterosexual couples. They couldn’t pledge their love for each other in a formal marriage ceremony, with their love deemed to be ‘unworthy’ of being recognised by the state, simply for being two members of the same sex. What does that tell a kid who is realising their sexuality, confused about the feelings they have, and why what the world is telling them is ‘wrong’ feels so right, but wrong, but… right? It doesn’t offer much hope in easing that confusion/in reassuring them that their feelings are not ‘wrong’, hence why so many people do struggle to express their sexuality as it actually is and not as they think it should be in order to appease society’s expectations…
A notable example of someone who publically struggled to express his sexuality back in’t day can be seen in Elton John when his marriage to a woman (pictured above) made the news, arguably an attempt to detract from any narrative of him being gay, a potential career-ender in the 60s when he first started out.
As Elton John wrote in an Instagram post to address his first marriage,
‘I wanted more than anything to be a good husband, but I denied who I really was, which caused my wife sadness, and caused me huge guilt and regret.’
Elton and his sound technician wife, Renate Blauel, divorced after four years, with Elton coming out as gay shortly afterward. Not that his coming out came as a surprise… Rod Stewart’s congratulatory telegram to Elton on his wedding day just about summed up the mood:
“You may still be standing, but we’re all on the fucking floor.”
The choice to embrace ones queerness is very much that- a choice. However, being queer itself is not a choice. As Elton John proved, to use the example above, one can deny their sexuality, and choose to live a lie, but it doesn’t change anything. Marrying a woman as a gay man doesn’t eradicate same-sex attraction. And so ultimately, denying who you are, pretending to be something/someone that you are not, is futile. It doesn’t change who you are, it just leaves you thinking that who you are is ‘wrong’/something that you have to hide. And, as we all know, when you deny yourself something, it only makes you want it more, as is proven by diets (they don’t work) and, to stick with the theme of this article, conversion therapy (it doesn’t work).
Having sex with another woman, as a woman, is a choice, but the fundamental sexual attraction to said woman isn’t a choice. People cannot choose how their nervous system reacts to stimuli.
To people who do claim that being gay is a choice, the concept should be turned on its head and applied to them.
‘If being gay is a ‘lifestyle choice’, then so is being straight.’
‘You have chosen the straight lifestyle, but you can just as easily choose the gay one.’
‘I want you to flip the switch and become gay.’
^ You can’t. You just really, really, can’t… But, alas, see how they respond. Because, based on their theory that sexuality is chosen, they are choosing to be straight, in which case they could sleep with someone of the same sex and be turned on. Sounds ridiculous, right? That’s because it is, yet it is exactly what straight people say about gay people. When straight men say to lesbians ‘You’ve not tried this one’, as though they genuinely believe that sexuality can change at the click of a finger, ridiculous. Ridiculous that, if a gay man were to echo this sentiment to a straight man, ‘You’ve not tried this one’, they’d be punched in the face. But as always, double standards.
‘Being gay is not a choice, just like being straight is not a choice. People don’t wake up one morning when they are 12 and decide they want to be harassed and hated by the ignorant masses for the rest of their lives.’
The choice to act on one’s sexual attraction is what some religious people use against gay people. Just because someone is born a ‘sinner’, it doesn’t mean that they should sin, is what some religious people claim. But to them, I would ask, what’s the alternative? To live a lie? Because yes, one can indeed deny their desires, squash them down, wish away their existence, but they’re always going to be there (squashing something down does not get rid of it) when ‘it’ is out of control, ‘in-built’, something within, NOT a choice.
Like trying to change our eye color, we cannot change our sexuality because it is who we are, not something that we ‘choose.’
Kids are kicked out of their homes for being gay, and disowned by their entire families, simply for falling in love with the ‘wrong’ gender. if sexuality was a choice, do you really think that people would choose that? Do you think that people would choose to risk their lives for being open about their desires? To risk prosecution, execution, even? Who would choose that, if it were a choice?
Overcome with a sense of gratitude for all those who came before us, for all of the people who had to fight for their right to exist in a world within which being gay was a crime, not just in their own minds but according to society at large:
Thank you.
<3
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