#hetronormativity

One of the ways I view Moana is as an allegory for bisexuality. 

The island of Motunui representing hetronormativity, while the ocean is queerness. Moana’s parents are telling her to stay on the island, where everything is “normal” and safe. The ocean is dangerous, you don’t know what’s out there, you know what’s expected of you here.  “His best friend begged to be on that boat.” Grandma Tala tells Moana that her father used to be like her, wanting to go to the ocean. I see this as experimenting with queerness. He and his best friend experimented with queerness and he lost he friend because of it and so viewed it as dangerous, and wanting to keep his daughter safely in hetronormativity.

“and no one leaves” in the song Where You Are everyone is trying to convince Moana of how great the island is and how happy she should be. That nothing changes and no one leaves. Telling her to conform to hetronormativity. 

Like so many thing being “out” is talked about as a binary, you’re either closeted, or you’re a out. In mainstream queer narratives (see: Brokeback Mountain, Milk, or Boys Don’t Cry) being queer we’re told is hard, but being out, even if it means facing discrimination, violence or death, is “honest” and the preferred state. 

Often, in real life things are far more complicated.

It is a false dichotomy that people are either closeted or out. They can be out to some people, and not others. This is in fact, the norm for most LGBTQ+ people. What does being out really mean, anyway? That you know you’re queer; that everyone who knows you knows it? Do you have to tell everyone you meet? If you don’t, are you still “out”?

Historically Coming Out Day was founded as National Coming Out Day in the US in the 80s. In the midst of the AIDS crisis when much of mainstream society saw being gay as equivalent of diseased, AIDS was even called “gay-related immune deficiency” before it became AIDS and the “the gay cancer ” by certain talking heads. National Coming Out Day was an attempt to reframe being LGB (specifically at the time) as positive and to make coming out empowering.

There is an easy appeal of this reasoning and for some people, coming out is an important milestone, a chance to take ownership of their identity/ies and experiences. Ideally the news is greeted with warmth and cheer.

However, Coming Out Day also perpetuates the very thing that needs to be eradicated to ensure queer liberation: heteronormativity and patriarchy. The assumption that straight and cisgendered are “normal” or some sort of universal-default, that all other sexual orientations and gender identities are some sort of aberration. As Dorothy Parker said, “Heterosexuality isn’t normal, it’s just common”. Having a day dedicated to queer people coming out emphasizes coming out as a queer-only experience. Cisgendered-straight people don’t have to come out, because everyone is assumed to be straight and cisgendered until they say otherwise.

There is a tendency to over-emphasize coming out as some defining element of someone’s identity, that fails to recognise the incremental nature of the process. Coming out is not safe for everyone in all contexts, it is not the most important part of queer experience. The most important part of being queer is knowing yourself.

The “closet” is oft framed as a dark, unhappy place. Being “out” is stepping into the light and being honest and free, but free from what? Given the disproportionate number of homeless young people who identify as LGBTQ+, who cite their identity as a factor in their homelessness it is worth considering this narrative critically. In an ideal world everyone would be free to come out without fear, statistics show we are not yet in that ideal world.

There is no right or wrong way to be queer. People don’t have to tell anyone any details about their lives if they don’t want to. People need to do what is best for them.