Lexi Felix

Bonus:

I have never seen so many suits and khakis IN MY LIFE. People who accidentally wore jeans went home and changed.

The community took it as a rebuke. We drew in closer to eachother, and felt unwelcome everywhere we thought we had friends before.

And I had people later tell me “You know I support you, just… I didn’t want anyone to think I was.” First off, I DON’T know you support me. Not if you refuse to, for one day, change nothing about your life to show it. Second off… why is that such a terrifying thought to you?

I remember before rainbows were a “gay thing”. They were everywhere. Church walls next to arks. School walls next to sunshine faces. People have VOLUNTARILY abandoned every other use. I have HEARD PEOPLE SAY they just couldn’t use rainbows anymore because people would think of “gay stuff.”

So I know this is a joke, and a stolen one at that, but you’ve done this to yourselves. If someone is so terrified of being perceived as queer that they will INSTANTLY abandon something they like if it has queer germs on it now or something, then they don’t deserve refracted light.

*The word queer is used as an umbrella term for all the LGBT+ spectrum

As humans, one of our deeper desires is to connect with one another, to feel like we’re a part of something and to have that amazing feeling of belonging. That’s why our favorite books are the ones we feel more connect to or that our favorite songs are the ones that speaks to us through lyrics or melody. But what if you can’t connect to any story, whether it’s in a book, a song or a movie, because none of them represent you? Living in a heteronormative society, queer people often feel alienated more than you’d think. Growing up without feeling represented in music, TV and books was hard because I loved all three of them. I remember loving to read books. My dad used to give me two every month but and I’d go through both in less than a week. But the more I read the less I saw myself in all those straight love stories. It was hard entering a huge bookstore with thousands of books but only a handful was a lesbian love story. Not to mention the one time I asked for recommendation of a good lesbian love story to the bookstore helper and he guided me to the smut books section. So there is no doubt in my mind that we seek representation in the media and that representation matters.

But the main problem right now with the representation of LGBT+ people in the media is the misguided thought that we want any kind of representation. That may have worked 50 years ago but things have changed. Now, it’s not only about being represented in music or TV, but also being represented right. Therefore, hearing a song on the radio about same sex couple having fun and kissing and doing whatever make them happy does feels amazing, but it masks an ugly truth when you look closely to how the song came about. Particularly with the song Girls, one of the main ugly truths is that 90% of the writers were men. That on and of itself is something that personally makes me cringe specially when you hear “have her down with the scissor” and parts that should only sound outgoing and metaphorical but becomes predatory when you remember that it was written by men. A second ugly truth is that only one of the artists is openly queer, although you need to research that fact about her to learn about it. No one is obligated to wave a rainbow flag around but if you are going to sing a song about girl kissing girls and were, and I quote, “inspired by all the strong women I’ve seen who aren’t afraid to be themselves”, why didn’t you invite other women who aren’t afraid to say out loud that they actually kiss girls? If you’re going to sing about, and again I quote, “a celebration of love”, why didn’t you invite people who actually understand what that love feels like?

The answer to those questions and to the question of why men are writing about two women loving each other is the real ugly truth of why songs like Girls are problematic: the media industry doesn’t allow queer people to represent queer people. We see the industry praising straight artists who portrait or sing about queer love, tolerance and support to the LGBT+ community but as soon as an artist comes out as queer, doors are immediately closed. The industry pats you in the back for doing such a great job supporting the community, as long as you’re not in it. That’s why songs like Girls are problematic. Because we are tired of only being heard if it’s by the voice of an ally. I’d like to emphasize that I’m not, not even for one second, implying that our allies should stay silent or that their support hasn’t been extremely beneficial to help us get where we are now. What I’m really saying is that they helped us start a dialogue with people who weren’t willing to listen to us but there has come the time that we need to be heard without a mediator.

That doesn’t apply only for queer representation but any minority. It took Jessica Chastain, a white woman, demands for Octavia Spencer to be paid an equal amount for the film they were both in, but other women of color are being shut down when asked for equal pay when they don’t have the support of their white colleagues. Benedict Cumberbatch is being praised for saying he won’t act in movies where women are not paid equally as men, but everyone was quick to call Ellen Pompeo, the main character of Grey’s Anatomy, greedy for demanding to be paid more than Patrick Dempsey. The ugly truth is that women are only heard if men speak for them. People of color are only heard if white people speak for them. Queer people are only heard when straight people speak for them. And although that helps us get a platform, it’s time for us to let our voices be heard. This transition needs to happen and needs to happen right now because although we have more representation in the media today then we have ever had before, we are being represented in ways that are harmful for the artists and the community.

This becomes clearer specially in the movies and TV industry. The demand for more female producers and writers is not only to stop the sexism rooted in our culture, but also because women are tired of being represented as an oversexualized, shallow, unidimensional and submissive character. You can only write about different and complexed females if you are one or if you have done extensive research and interviews with other women. The same goes when you’re writing about different cultures or backgrounds. So why should it be different with LGBT+ people? Why should we accept only the stereotyped gay-best-friend guy or the angry butch lesbian or the derogatory portrait of trans people? And why those were the only representation we had for so many years? This is what happens when LGBT+ people aren’t invited for the creative construction of LGBT+ characters, alongside with toxic queerbaiting and the Bury Your Gays trope. In contrast, we can have allies like Chyler Leigh who has reached out to the community, investing herself so much in learning and understanding the impact of her representation that she became the biggest advocate for a rightful and respectful writing of her character. Because of her, Alex Danvers is now one of the best and most loved queer character on television and Chyler’s panel on ClexaCon was one of the most honest and heartfelt interviews of the conference. The point to all of this is that not every queer character has be played by a queer actor/actress, but that if you’re not personally experienced with the story you should welcome people who are and learn from them. The same goes for the music industry.

How many careers have been halted or destroyed because the artist decided to come out? How many queer songwriters, producers and singers out there are having to fight their way up countless time as hard as their cis-straight colleagues? And they must go through all this while hearing the LGBT+ songs they would die to be part of being performed and created by those cis-straight colleagues. And again, you don’t need to wave a rainbow flag everywhere you go, but it does sting seeing an artist who has done nothing to support the community capitalizing on our craving for representation because we so desperately lack it and, at this point, would take whatever. That’s why collaborations like Halsey and Lauren Jauregui or Hayley Kiyoko and Kehlani are important. Not because you need to be gay to sing/write a gay song but because supporting other artists who truly understand what it means to sing/write about loving and kissing someone of the same sex, in this industry and in real life, helps giving queer artists the visibility they deserve. Another reason is that those artists know how to write/sing about loving women without making it taboo, having sex with women without making it molded to male fetishes or loving men and women without slut-shaming.