Queerness is not about being loud, present and colourful. In some cases, it’s about overcoming learned self-loathing.
When I watched the first episode of the Netflix series “Heartstopper” about a year ago, I had no idea that an emotional roller coaster ride would await me – and many other queer people in the world. The ending of this wonderful, stirring, charming series left me with an unexpectedly deep sense of sadness: I got to watch teenagers make their first queer loves and face the fact that that youth would never be a reality for me .
Mine consisted of the supposedly incontrovertible fact, regularly confirmed by many fellow human beings, that queerness is something wrong. Anyone who is queer, especially gay, becomes the target of ridicule, vulgar insults, physical attacks. And didn’t deserve anything else. This is youth as I experienced it, as many people experienced it and still experience it today. For me – and maybe for some others too – Pride Month is not primarily about being loud, present and colourful. But to overcome the instilled self-loathing, a little more every day.
Four queer people are victims of violence every day
A fictional series like “Heartstopper” aroused ambivalent emotions in me. As already mentioned, there was one side: the melancholy side, mourning what she would never experience – the first great love of her youth. I didn’t even dare to think of something like that back then. But another side of me also dared to emerge at that time: the hopeful, the side in me that wishes for other people not to have to go through these tormenting doubts, the harassment and this overwhelming feeling of loneliness and being lost.
But the reality has so far shattered every naive hope: Statistically, four queer people are victims of a violent act in Germany every day, according to figures from the criminal police reporting service. In figures, that means 1,005 hate crimes related to sexual orientation in 2022, compared to 870 a year earlier, which corresponds to an increase of 16 percent. “These numbers can only be the tip of the iceberg,” says queer politician Ulle Schauws (Greens) in an interview with “queer.de”, referring to the number of unreported hate crimes against queer people, after all, not every crime is reported. Insults, exclusion, threats – how many of these end up in court? On the other hand, they find their place very securely in the mind of a person who is at the mercy of these things on a daily basis.
We don’t have to look to Florida, where, among other things, a real smear campaign against queerness is currently being carried out. Even here in Germany, where not a few people get tired of having to “constantly” read and hear about queer topics, the situation is anything but good – even if queer people are very happy to sell it that way. According to the federal government’s Human Rights Commissioner, Luise Amtsberg, queer people face criminal prosecution in more than 60 countries around the world, and the death penalty in seven. And in Germany, the situation with regard to crimes against queer people is “still far from good” for everyone six years after the introduction of marriage, according to Amtsberg.
Which is also what some Pride Month is about
What happens in the mind of a person who regularly experiences discrimination? Who is told over and over again, “You’re wrong. You’re gross. I hope you die.” Recently, two scientists presented in one meta-analysis realized the immense damage bullying can do to young people’s brains. The neurological interplay between the brain regions would “contribute to sensitivity to facial expressions, poor cognitive reasoning, and stress,” which would negatively affect behavioral control and emotion regulation.
What does that mean? Ultimately, a child interprets the facial expressions and behavior of those around him in the worst possible way, is constantly on guard, and has to live with the fear of being verbally or physically attacked at any moment. Just like my husband and I when we sit together on the train, touch each other, laugh together, hug each other. We both feel the looks on us, the judgment. The fear that regularly rises in me when a male read person approaches us, the thoughts of all the people who have already been murdered because they are queer – I wouldn’t wish that on anyone.
The hate, the hostilities, the lack of understanding, the crooked looks: queer people experience discrimination every day all over the world. Whether they wear a dress as a male and are touched, whether they are insulted because they hold hands with an apparently same-sex person, whether they are beaten into a coma because they dare to stand up for their basic rights and open their mouths. “We all grow up homophobic and transphobic, and queer kids don’t have magic earbuds,” writes author Matthew Todd for The Guardian.
All of this affects people, even if we all don’t want it to – for my part I don’t want to give those tormentors of queer people the satisfaction that what they say and do hurts. I want to be above it. I want to know my worth, be proud of the person I’ve become – not through my environment, but despite those around me for most of my entire childhood and early adolescence. Some queer people say that they are particularly funny or particularly friendly when dealing with people so as not to be seen as a threat, not to be seen as a target. Others are angry and loud. And still others dip themselves in glitter, take to the streets and brighten up the gray world around them.
We all have our coping strategies, and fortunately not all of us have ingrained self-loathing. But we all grew up in a heteronormative world, which for a long time and still today tells us one thing above all: you are not right the way you are. Luckily – and unfortunately – a heterosexual cis person will probably never be able to empathize with that.
So finally a request to that majority society: The next time you feel like all of these queer people are “too much”, “too loud”, “too present”, please consider that many of these people have been oppressed, insulted and hurt for a long time in their lives and some until become today. Remember that they are “a lot” and “loud” and “present” because quite a few people in the world wish they didn’t exist and are doing everything in their power to make that happen.
Keep in mind that some of them want to unlearn the self-loathing they’ve been instilled with from those around them all their lives.
Sources used: queer.de, zdf.de, pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov, theguardian.com, vox.com