Henlo

he is an artist ☺️

source 1, 2, 3.

I do it too, I’m not going to pretend I don’t make jokes about the hets, or the down with cis bus, or whatever

But I recently befriended a cis, straight dude and I have watched him be dismissed, degraded, and unambiguously insulted for the perceived “crime” of being straight — all in queer environments where he is allegedly “completely welcome” and surrounded by “friends”

This guy is not a toxic person! But I have seen him be made to feel so small and like his comfort and safety in those spaces are conditional on his silence and acceptance of being treated like a human dunk zone, and I think that some of y’all have had so much shit from straight/cis people that the second you feel like you’ve got an inch, you want to luxuriate in the perceived catharsis of bullying someone who— actually —doesn’t deserve it

And until he very, very carefully mentioned to me in private that it makes him feel bad, I didn’t even clock that I was involved in doing that, that it had become so instinctive for me to make casual jokes like that, and that— well meaning or otherwise —I had been contributing to an environment that made someone I really really like feel like shit

I’m gonna say this point blank— you’re a tar pit if you think this way

Your suffering does not make you special, you are not granted brand new permissions to be belligerent and cruel because you have been treated poorly, straight people aren’t an oppressed class, no, but they’re people who are entitled to the same amount of basic decency that you, yourself, are entitled to

Before I realized I was ace/aro, I was the “token straight” in an old friend group. These “friends” would constantly belittle and poke fun at me for it. At first I thought it was funny and even joked along with it. But over time, I began to realize that I was the only one that the jokes were aimed at. They never poked fun of each other’s sexualities. Only mine. I tried to tell myself that they didn’t mean it in a bad way, but over time as the jokes kept coming, I just kept feeling worse and worse, and their treatment of me got more vitriolic over time. As far as I was ever aware, I had never done anything to cause this change in treatment, aside from just being cis and straight. I was dismissed for it, excluded from hangouts, pretty much everything that OP described above, and it made me feel so othered among people I was formerly pretty close with.

After I left that group, I genuinely hated queer people. I thought that if that was how I was treated among even people I considered my closest friends, then I couldn’t trust any queer folks to not treat me the same way.

And that entire time, I was still queer. I just didn’t know it yet. The way I was treated actively put me off from the idea of exploring myself and the possibility of not being straight, and it genuinely made me homophobic for a while.

1.) Not all our parents would bake us a fucking cake when we come out. Some of us are closeted. Surely you understand this? You also do not need to know my parent’s names or occupations; we are both adults. I do not need nor want to mix you and my private life with my parents and my public life.

2.) Trans people do not owe you their dead name or government name

3.) I’m not telling you for the sake of job security. I am a government fucking caseworker working amidst a fucking lavender panic!

“There’s no way you’re a different person outside this; you’re still you at your core. What harm is there—”

No, I am a completely different person. A different person with a different personality and different interests and a different name and presentation. I am a completely different person because I keep this life and my public life private to avoid fracturing 90% of my interpersonal relationships and 100% of my professional ones.

“You’re not out? But you’re so confident.”

I need y’all to start bringing that energy. Because it’s not always safe for someone to be out and not everyone is safe to be out around.

Showing off the Arapaima I made! (Pattern also made by me)

the gender ratio for azurill is 75% female whilst for marill it’s only 50%.