Kristen Arnett: "I Know What It's Like to Be a Florida Teen Who Can't Say Gay"

[Nevilledog]

Link to tweet

https://time.com/6157302/dont-say-gay-florida-kristen-arnett-disney/

Growing up, I never kept a diary. There were no journals hidden beneath my twin mattress, no spiral-bound collection of ruffled notebooks stuffed with private confidences. I was a voracious reader who devoured books in secret, in defiance of my strict evangelical parents, but when it came to my personal feelings, I allowed nothing of myself to migrate onto the page. Writing felt treacherous; a way to accidentally reveal too much. The few times that I did manage to pen any of my feelings, I immediately shredded everything, crumpled papers stuffed at the bottom of the garbage can, hidden beneath scraps of the previous night’s dinner.

Those scribblings were too unruly, I thought at the time, unwilling to let any of it live outside the privacy of my head. Regardless, my hopes and fears sometimes erupted from the watched pot of my brain, boiling over to reveal truths I was desperate to hide. A swirl of images spit and hissed steam beneath the lid: friends changing out of wet bathing suits after a pool party, the heart-shaped sweat mark on a girl’s back during gym class on an especially sweltering Central Florida afternoon, the sun tracing shiny golden tinsel into a woman’s plaited hair. The memories flickered neon red at the edges, warning of danger. There was something unacceptable about them. Something scary.

I know now why I couldn’t write them down. My words were too gay.

As an adult, I can see that the smothering of the queerness that lived inside me led to long, tumultuous years of depression and misery. So much of that overwhelming despair could have been abated by the simple act of voicing the unsaid thing. All those times I cried myself sick and prayed for death, I needed the words. Whenever I sliced at my skin, or when I pulled the hair from my head in order to feel something other than the self-loathing of my secret burden, I needed that frustratingly inaccessible language. If only I were allowed a sentence. Even a word. If I could tell someone, anyone, without fear of repercussion, then I’d have found relief. I’m gay, I would have said. And the immediate follow-up: I’m gay and I’m scared.

It was fear that kept me silent. Because I knew that the things I felt were not acceptable. Not to my parents or my friends, and certainly not in Orlando. I found places online where I could hide, small hubs of support. But there was none of that relief in high school in the late ’90s. The few teens I knew who had the label “gay” attached to them suffered through continuous shame and abuse. Most of them fled after graduating, out of Central Florida to anywhere with an existing LGBTQ+ community. Young people, already faced with the stress and anxiety of coming out, knew that the additional obstacles placed in front of them by the edicts of our conservative state meant they wouldn’t be able to thrive. It took years of stewing in anguish for me to finally come out. It took finding the words. Those words led me to queer community, allowing me to understand that I wasn’t alone. Only then did the fear begin to dissipate.

*snip*

[leftieNanner]

1. The Abject and Uninformed Cruelty being imposed by Florida

and other (anything but) conservative states is appalling. They cannot and will not consider the fact that every one of us is different from the other. In some fundamental way, we all bring interesting and special gifts to the table. This is a good thing for humanity - but it's too scary for them to contemplate.

The homeless children - thrown out of the house by their parents - in our area have some help from a great organization here, but it's horrible to imagine any parent being so closed minded to do this.