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lectures that made me think...too much

2002-02-02 - 1:02 a.m.

Classes started back partially this week at uni.Only my film classes have been on but i think thats a good thing.I've had a lot to think about this week and all from only one set of lectures.I think i needed the week to get my head around a lot of it.

This term we're studying national and cultural identities. I always knew that this was going to be a term that would really interest me.I didn't realise that it would be so difficult to deal with though.That so many issues would be raised,and that so many of them would be so personal to me.

When minority groups were talked about before i knew that i fitted into one of them nicely,my sexuality automatically puts me in one of those categories. I was looking forward to it,knowing we'd be discussing the old 'celluloid closet',gender issues,general ideas of identity,studying films like 'Boys Don't Cry'. We only just began to scrape the surface this week but already my intense interest has,although not gone in any way, also become a niggling discomfort.

Our new lecturer doesn't believe in formal lectures but instead encourages group discussion,talking out in class, challenging,arguing even with her,sets little tasks for us to do that make us think.Ok so sometimes we feel as if we're back in primary school but i think what she's doing is probably a good idea.Instead of sitting and mindlessly writing notes on auto-pilot she gets us to think and relate the issues to ourselves..i think in a funny way we might actually be learning something from lectures this term.Or at least i hope it works out like that.

I think she may be gay,the lecturer, thats not a definite think..just a think...then again if you read her lectures without seeing her and just paid attention to the argument she makes you might think she was a member of any or numerous minority groups.She really does like to argue her point.

Anyway all of this is arbitrary really.

My real discomfort/ interest binary comes in during the little discussion things she makes us do and especially at times during our tutorial this week. I have so many points of view that i feel i can't put forward cos they would 'give me away'. I wouldn't particularly mind being out in my class.. the only thing that really stops me is a guy in my group whos parents know my parents and i don't want to upset them any more right now.In many ways though i feel like it's almost essential this term that i should be out: i don't feel like i can be my 'real' self if i'm not...and the whole term is about identity.How can i discuss a subject like that if i'm not even comfortable enough with my own identity to be open about it?

During our tutorial this week there was a lot of discussion about gay things...as there has been in the lectures in general..some of the stuff people were saying made me so mad. There was the girl who said she often went to gay clubs with her 'gay friend' and felt totally comfortable around 'the gays'. She felt though that when she was in a gay club people all assumed that she was gay,eventhough she's not(as she pointed out several times) and people had said to her that loads of straight people went to gay clubs but she didn't feel like that when she was there..another girl agreed with her saying that 'they' would often ask her how long she had been out for or if she had told her parents..and she found it difficult to explain that she wasn't gay and was just there with friends. It doesn't sound like much right now i s'pose but at the time words like 'they' 'my gay friend' and 'the gays' just got to me a lot. It's that whole mentality of 'oh i'm liberal,i have no prejudices but i still refer to people as them and us'.

I had to point out that if a gay person is in a straight club dancing with someone of the opposite sex then it's automatically assumed that they're together..people might not ask you if you're straight but thats only because they take it for granted that you are,so why should it be any different in a predominantly gay environment? She didn't really know how to answer that and the tutor jumped in saying it was a good point..he seemed to be talking with inside knowledge as well and talked more like i felt rather that how the rest of the group talked..maybe he just has more insight than them...or maybe he's gay too i don't know..but anyway...

There was another woman who seemed to need to argue against everyone about whatever point they made..even if they were making exactly the same point as her...she presented everything as an argument...I had said something which she was basically agreeing with but managed to turn my whole argument around to make it seem like i was being prejudiced...i did eventually manage to make her see that i was making the same point but i so felt like saying 'excuse me,as a gay person i think i'm more qualified to talk about how gay people may or may not feel about certain things rather than most of the rest of you who are just presuming to know how we feel about stuff!'

I know that i'm ranting about age old problems that are not going to be solved overnight and that i'm not the first person to experience,usually i don't allow it to annoy me so much,but this time.I don't know.Maybe because the whole week had made me think so much and i'm anticipating and worrying about what might come next...we haven't even got to the actual gay part of the course yet!

I used to and still do sit in groups of people and wonder if there was a gay person there....sit and think..who here might be gay..eventually i came to realise that i was thinking that was because the gay person in the group was me.And this week has made me so aware of that.The tutor asked if any of us could think of a situation where we had been made to feel 'other' to the predominant group....i was sitting thinking,yeah-right here,right now..i'm one of 'them' 'the gays' that you're all so comfortable around..i'm one of those who goes to a gay bar because i'm actually gay ,not because i have a gay friend and it's the cool liberal thing to do..to lower yourself to prove how great a person you are...being nice to the minority and everything.I'm one of those people who instead goes to a straight club with my straight friends and dances across from my partner not allowed to touch or kiss,or if we do we either get strange looks or guys think we're just doing it to turn them on and stand gawking at us(and don't get me wrong,there are plenty of actually open minded straight folk around,but i'm talking about the ones above) A gay bar or club is only a gay bar or club because in this day and age it still has to be specified as such. It still has to have the label 'gay' infront of it..it can't be just another bar...and when it still has to be like that i don't think it's too unfair to assume that the people in it are actually gay.

Straight venues are not usually specified but that's because straightness is such a visible institution of society that it has become invisible,it isn't given a second thought..the only reason people are caused to think about it is when we're questioning it.And gay/lesbian/bisexual/transsexual/ and all of us who are other than straight are expected to be fine with that.If people think that it's difficult to explain to a gay person that they are straight then they should try it the other way around.

The tutor also made the point that ambiguity is threatening,when someone turns out to be other than what they appear...the case of the gay man or lesbian who doesn't fit the stereotype..when people say 'I would never have thought....you can't be !..you don't look like one...' and there i was thinking..thats me again. The cases that i know i've referred to on my journal...that party at J's house with that girl who told me i was 'so pretty as well' and the guys on boxing day who told me i couldn't play that joke on them.Probably one of the problems that my parents have with it as well,i don't seem the type.I sometimes wonder if it would have been any easier for them to accept if i had cropped hair,was interested in cars,drank beer,liked football,played pool.Would it have made the transition any easier? Would they have seen it coming?

I dunno.

There were so many other things that ran through my head during the classes this week.So many things that applied to me,so many times when i was the 'other', so many times when i sat there thinking,is there anyone else here sitting thinking the exact same as me but not wanting to say? And that's the problem with not saying,i'll never know .

It might be a bit different next week...film girl has been off all week but she just loves speaking out and making her opinions known.Problem is she's also very militant and i know that what she says probably still won't fit in with what i think.

Which takes me back to the beginning really.This is something i feel so strongly about and i feel like it's my duty in some way to at least attempt to explain a few things to people,tell them how it really is and not just how they think it is.And i don't want to be scared of expressing the 'wrong' opinion and yet again have people talking about me behind my back and know that rumours are flying.This time i want to do it right and be just who i am,not needing 2 separate identities and trying to keep them apart because i know that it isn't going to work, i think it rarely does.

In some ways i feel like it'll be worse if i sit through this whole term and keep quiet about it and then tell them at a later time.Then they might wonder why i didn't tell them now when it's so relevant to any contributions i have to make.

I know that they don't need to know.They don't have the right to know what my sexual practices are and it's certainly not the only thing that defines me as who i am.But what if i need them to know?i should have the right to be myself. Not just one of 'them'.

Maybe another part of the problem is that i've only just started to make friends with some people in class. i don't know if i've ever really had a sense of completely belonging somewhere(apart from with Levi) and maybe i'm just scared.

Scared that when i'm just starting to make some tiny connection with new people that i'll risk losing them.

Scared that yet again i won't ever belong.

Scared too that perhaps its just my own closure that's stopping me from belonging.

And i don't have a clue how to handle it.

I don't want to risk finding out.

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