The Queer Identity Series:
Part 1
In front of me stands a boy, slender build with swooped brown hair and a perfectly formed curl sitting on top of his forehead. A pink dream and unequivocally camp in nature, he moves graciously through the crowds greeting everyone he passes. When he laughs, they laugh when he smiles, they smile.
As I look on with admiration, I question how someone who was once ridiculed and beaten, is now commanding all of the attention. But I know the answer is so blatantly obvious. The way he loves now aligns with the way he presents himself. He is no longer hiding. He is now understood and accepted by those who once mocked him. He has finally been put into that sparkly gay box they so desired for him to be in. Does he sit in there comfortably? I do not know, but what I do know is that for once he is happy.
But it seems as though the brush that once tarnished this boy is now with me. But where we differ is that we do not present ourselves in the same way. We do not walk, talk, or dress the same. We are opposites, yet identical in the eyes of many. If I try my best to act in the same way, maybe I could be loved. But I cannot, like a pack of hyenas they will come for blood if I do not submit to a stereotype they deem fit for me.
Why can’t we exist in the same space? Yes, we love the same but that is only a fraction of who we are as people. We do not have anything in common, yet he is applauded because he mimics the representations they see on the television. I do not, so therefore I cannot be placed in the same box. The boys do not like me because I hang out with the girls, yet the girls do not like me because we do not share the same interests. It seems there is only room for one of us, and sadly that space is not for me. I am an anomaly, a riddle they cannot seem to solve.