Ken Alexander: Homosexuality is the worst of sins

[polecat]

Someone on Lori's FB page just posted this:

I'm going to be obsessively refreshing until she deletes it or answers.

I didn't grow up in a quiverfull family, but we were definitely fundy. And a lot of this resonated with me.

Perhaps most of all the fact that fundies live carefully scripted lives even if they don't have their own tv shows. I can't even tell you how many Sunday mornings we drove to church (really any service, but it was far worse on Sundays) with my parents either screaming at each other or at us kids, sometimes getting in a few well-placed slaps or pinches for good measure. As soon as we pulled into the church parking lot, however, it was, "Sit up, wipe those tears off your face and start smiling!" We were so well trained that we didn't even have to be told. We absolutely WOULD walk into that church a happy family or there would be hell to pay.

If I had to guess what was most destructive about my childhood, it wasn't being molested. It wasn't the constant emotional abuse. It wasn't even the frequent physical abuse. It wasn't living in a powder keg just waiting for the spark, walking on eggshells, knowing you could be knocked down with a backhand at any minute because you had a "rebellious expression." You know what it was? It was the lies. The "put on a happy face" shit so that everyone would think our lives were perfect. It was the denying what I felt so that I wouldn't embarrass (or anger) my parents. It was the constant fakery. The pretending. The denying who I *was*.

Funny thing, lying is against the 10 commandments. God said nothing about pants. He said nothing about being in church every time the doors opened. He said nothing about not holding hands because it would lead to fornication. But He did say not to lie. Yet our whole lives were lies. And so are the Duggars. I don't even need to watch (and I don't) to know that. Her sickly sweet voice is just like every pastor's wife I've ever known. Those pasted-on grins? Fake. All of it is a lie and one that is completely and totally damaging to every single child being raised in that family. Even if the Duggars don't beat their kids, even if they never raise their voices, even if they never treat their kids with anything less than kid gloves -- they're still destroying their kids' very souls with the incessant lying.

tl;dr: The Duggars aren't just lying to the world. They're lying to themselves, and they're destroying their kids in the process.

PS: Sorry about the book. This is a really touchy subject for me.

[formergothardite]

I am older and incredibly well educated, dear. I have lived and traveled all over the world, and I have all sorts of friends with various backgrounds or who were not born straight, white Chrisitians with a narrow world view. I have seen several posts from you tinged with or blatant about your racism and homophobia. Have you forgotten what you posted in the homeschool thread? I have not. You even knew it was racist because you said you did not care if you sounded racist. I do not find racism or homophobia respectful. I do not find deeming people sinful because of who they are or less than you because of their culture or circumstances of birth respectful.

Respect is earned and Free Jinger is not a place where you are entitled to opinion without others challenging it or finding it abhorrent. Hating the sin but not the sinner is the one of the biggest loads of bigoted hypocrisy the modern Christianist movement has foisted upon us, and I, for one, won't dance around my disgust.

:clap:

It is amusing that she accuses you of name calling all while passive aggressively calling you young and uneducated. She attacked your age and level of education because she couldn't address what you said. :lol:

[jerkit]

For some reason, today's "enlightened" woman feels like she can only handle a few children.

Says the woman who stopped at four.

[usmcmom]

Says the woman who stopped at four.

And she couldn't be bothered to do much with the four she had. She had a nanny, she banished them to their rooms for hours at a time, and she made homeschooling easy for herself, not giving a bit of thought to the quality of education her kids were getting.

When fundies post about having a lot of kids it makes me really sad for those who just couldn't have the required large family. Some women WANT a large family and just can't have that many kids, for a number of reasons. And of course there is the expectation to have a lot of kids; and women just feel guilty for not living up to "God's plan" for them.

Personal note: I desperately wanted more than two children and, for a couple of reasons, it just wasn't meant to be. My husband is very good with children, especially babies. For years, others would watch him with babies that weren't ours and they'd look at me and say "you need to give him some more kids. " It crushed me. People are so thoughtless and I'm not surprised that Lori is one to once again pile on the baby guilt.

[BrownieMomma]

You are telling the gay people here who are in relationships they are sinners. That isn't respectful anymore than telling a person in an interracial relationship that they are wrong and sinning.

No, I haven't. I haven't accused anyone of anything. I am discussing and explaining what I understand, how I've been taught.

I have said the Bible says homosexuality is a sin. I have said I understand that to mean homosexual behavior, not simply having homosexual orientation. So you are wrong. I have not accused anyone of being a sinner.

[BrownieMomma]

I am older and incredibly well educated, dear. I have lived and traveled all over the world, and I have all sorts of friends with various backgrounds or who were not born straight, white Chrisitians with a narrow world view. I have seen several posts from you tinged with or blatant about your racism and homophobia. Have you forgotten what you posted in the homeschool thread? I have not. You even knew it was racist because you said you did not care if you sounded racist. I do not find racism or homophobia respectful. I do not find deeming people sinful because of who they are or less than you because of their culture or circumstances of birth respectful.

Respect is earned and Free Jinger is not a place where you are entitled to opinion without others challenging it or finding it abhorrent. Hating the sin but not the sinner is the one of the biggest loads of bigoted hypocrisy the modern Christianist movement has foisted upon us, and I, for one, won't dance around my disgust.

Yet for all you claim, your biggest weapon is to call me a bigot. For educated people, that's a no no. How are you any different or better than what you say disgusts you? Why is it okay for you to attack at a personal level like that?

Because of course, it's not. Whatever I might have learned from you will never happen now. You don't win people to your POV by calling them ugly names. That says far more about you than whatever it was you were trying to say about me.

[Burris]

Yet for all you claim, your biggest weapon is to call me a bigot. For educated people, that's a no no. How are you any different or better than what you say disgusts you? Why is it okay for you to attack at a personal level like that?

Because of course, it's not. Whatever I might have learned from you will never happen now. You don't win people to your POV by calling them ugly names. That says far more about you than whatever it was you were trying to say about me.

I have just one thing to say about your posts (since I've been too busy educting Ken to watch you very closely): I can understand the Bible is an inspired book. Even I believe that. But it was written by people, edited and collated by people, and intrpreted by people.

And people err.

John Wesley had a way to deal with the problem of human bungling in divine works. He argued religious readings should be looked at first - scripture, then through the lens of tradition, by the light of reason, and at last through experience.

Reason and experience tell me I have never heard a single good, logical argument against homosexuality in itself. The arguments I hear are down to, 'Well the Bible says it's wrong.'

Maybe the best way to test whether a prohibition is cultural or timeless is by looking at the fruit it bears. And here, at least, it bears loving, long-term couples who just happen to be of the same gender.

The reason certain factions have resorted to fearmongering to discredit the homosexual experience is because they have nothing else. Nothing.

Use your reason. Use your own experience - then come back and tell us all why homosexual relationships are wrong.

[browncoatslytherin]

Use your reason. Use your own experience - then come back and tell us all why homosexual relationships are wrong.

brownie can correct me if i'm wrong, but i'm thinking she was simply explaining what she was taught and how it was taught (i was taught the same things the same way). reading her posts, i'm not seeing where she said she agreed with it, necessarily. i've made quite a few posts myself from the pov of a fundie christian, as i grew up in it. i don't agree with those teachings anymore, and quite a few are very illogical and are full of fallacies. but they are what i would have said ten years ago, if presented with the same question or situation.

again, brownie can correct me if i'm wrong. i would just hate for this to spiral because of a misunderstanding.

[Sundaymorning]

Ken's words on starvation:

:angry-banghead:

Kristina gave us the answer to why these 100% straight Christians rail against something that doesn't apply to them. If they treated other things like they do being gay there would be no one left in church. When you focus on the sins that everyone does, it makes people feel bad, so they focus on the sin that doesn't apply to most them.

This. Isn't the worst sin usually something that either

- doesn't apply to you. So you can feel all superior and good about yourself. (I mean, who cares if I'm a lying, self-righteous, cheating son-of-a-bitch who treats his family and other people like crap. But hey, at least, I'm not a sodomite. Whew, what a relief!!)

- or the thing you secretely hate about yourself the most?

[Burris]

brownie can correct me if i'm wrong, but i'm thinking she was simply explaining what she was taught and how it was taught (i was taught the same things the same way). reading her posts, i'm not seeing where she said she agreed with it, necessarily. i've made quite a few posts myself from the pov of a fundie christian, as i grew up in it. i don't agree with those teachings anymore, and quite a few are very illogical and are full of fallacies. but they are what i would have said ten years ago, if presented with the same question or situation.

again, brownie can correct me if i'm wrong. i would just hate for this to spiral because of a misunderstanding.

I could be wrong. God knows it has happened before. But my understanding is that Browni is defending what she was taught.

*groan* Not everything one is taught is worth retaining. Sometimes, in fact, it's poison. And it's a terrible thing to discover - especially if you've already, and maybe irrevocably, acted on a false belief - that you were wrong the whole time.

[browncoatslytherin]

I could be wrong. God knows it has happened before. But my understanding is that Browni is defending what she was taught.

*groan* Not everything one is taught is worth retaining. Sometimes, in fact, it's poison. And it's a terrible thing to discover - especially if you've already, and maybe irrevocably, acted on a false belief - that you were wrong the whole time.

oh i get it. i do. i've found myself revising and putting in disclaimers in certain posts to say basically that i'm not necessarily defending the view personally, just saying what i was taught and how a fundie would defend a certain viewpoint, or something to that affect.

[formergothardite]

No, I haven't. I haven't accused anyone of anything. I am discussing and explaining what I understand, how I've been taught.

I have said the Bible says homosexuality is a sin. I have said I understand that to mean homosexual behavior, not simply having homosexual orientation. So you are wrong. I have not accused anyone of being a sinner.

The way you wrote it made it seem like you personally viewed homosexual activity as a sin. Am I clear in understanding that you do not view that as a sin?

[polecat]

I could be wrong. God knows it has happened before. But my understanding is that Browni is defending what she was taught.

*groan* Not everything one is taught is worth retaining. Sometimes, in fact, it's poison. And it's a terrible thing to discover - especially if you've already, and maybe irrevocably, acted on a false belief - that you were wrong the whole time.

I'd like to add that deprogramming can also take a while. The whole "omgtehgayz!" thing hadn't really started when I was a kid/teen, so I grew up thinking it was just a run-of-the-mill sexual sin, in the same category as fornication and adultery. I still went through different phases of acceptance as I deprogrammed. People yelling at me to change didn't change me (not that anyone did). People taking the time to explain their experiences/points of view and my willingness to listen and learn IS what changed me.

[2xx1xy1JD]

Now I'm just one of the lowly women folk and I do have a sinful college education, but that education did come from a Christian university at which Bible class was mandatory every semester (except my last one when I did field work off campus.) I don't claim to be an expert in scripture AT ALL, but some things did stick in my feeble female brain.

So my opinion means nothing, I know; but I always assumed that "the worst sin ever" would be the one the Bible classified as the only unpardonable sin.

Mark 3:22-30 states,

“And the scribes who came down from Jerusalem said, ‘He has Beelzebub,’ and, ‘By the ruler of the demons He casts out demons.’ …‘Assuredly, I [Jesus] say to you, all sins will be forgiven the sons of men, and whatever blasphemies they may utter; but he who blasphemes against the Holy Spirit never has forgiveness, but is subject to eternal condemnation;’ because they said, ‘He has an unclean spirit’†(NKJV, emphasis added / Note: The Pharisees made the same charge in Mat 9:34.).

In Matthew 12:31-32, Jesus says to the Pharisees,

“Therefore I say to you, every sin and blasphemy will be forgiven men, but the blasphemy against the Spirit will not be forgiven men. Anyone who speaks a word against the Son of Man, it will be forgiven him; but whoever speaks against the Holy Spirit, it will not be forgiven him, either in this age or in the age to come†(NKJV, emphasis added).

I don't think homosexuality would be considered a sin against the Holy Spirit because it is considered by people like Ken to be a sexual sin. The Bible specifically addresses sexual sin many times and it does not address it in regard to maligning the Holy Spirit.

This is what I've pointed out to those in the Orthodox Jewish community, as one of the reasons that we really don't want to partner with the Christian community in advocating faith-based political positions where there is no non-religious argument to support it. (Sorry, that's a mouthful.)

Simply put - we are not on the same team. Sure, they may argue that we are and do some Biblical quotes. There may be some issues where there is common ground, but the overall goals and approach are different.

I'm pretty sure that the same people who have a problem with gay sex also have a problem with the fact that I don't believe in Jesus. In fact, that may be an even bigger problem for them, based on the above quotes. If you take it as face value, it seems to be saying that denying Jesus is worse that anything else that you could ever do and damns you forever, while something like murder can totally be forgiven. [Needless to say, I find that a fairly fucked-up belief, but I know that it's a core belief in many denominations.]

So....if someone's able to argue that there's a problem with gay teachers, or that gays shouldn't have the right to marry, or that gays shouldn't be able to raise kids, because Bible, where exactly does that lead us? Because I'm pretty sure that if you ask some of these Christian leaders, they would tell you that non-Christians like me might be headed straight for hell, and they might not be too happy with Jewish teachers, and may not recognize my non-Christian marriage, and may have an issue with the fact that I'm raising my kids without Jesus and risking their eternal souls. Lori was actually pretty clear about the fact that she'd wish that any child of her that was like me would never have been born.

[Burris]

I'd like to add that deprogramming can also take a while. The whole "omgtehgayz!" thing hadn't really started when I was a kid/teen, so I grew up thinking it was just a run-of-the-mill sexual sin, in the same category as fornication and adultery. I still went through different phases of acceptance as I deprogrammed. People yelling at me to change didn't change me (not that anyone did). People taking the time to explain their experiences/points of view and my willingness to listen and learn IS what changed me.

That's a thing I understand. This might sound terrible, but I'm glad I'm not the only one with old prejudices that I know to be irrational (or worse). I try to weed them out when I encounter them, but there's always this terrible whisper, "They caused ruin. They stole from your people. They'll kill you and everyone you love if given the chance. THEY are the enemy!"

The rational part of me knows it's dangerous bullshit - that a government propaganda machine made things out of the air that I only later learned were completely false - as in, there was no factual basis; the censors cooked it up. We saw it. We believed it.

I understand Steven Anderson. Robert. Ken.

That is part of why they piss me off so much. I don't profess to be a mind-reader but I know what Anderson thinks:

‘I have boys, and diseased gay pedophiles want to assault them and ruin their lives. Homosexuality is a disease, an abhorrence, an anomaly - dangerous, indecent, and threatening.'

'If they gain enough power, they will turn on us like rabid animals - persecute us, infect us, destroy us.'

If I weren't typing this on a tablet I barely know how to use, I'd link the study that shows homosexuals make good parents to the same degree as heterosexual parent; that of course they love - their children, each other, their parents.

I don't remember ever having chosen to be straight, and I doubt any gay people remember choosing homosexuality either.

I remember a few years ago a panic caused by a journalist who claimed he had found an underground group of gay men who want to either give people AIDS or become infected by it. A lot of people around me were horrified.

And I made but one comment: "If these people exist, prove it - because I'll never again take the word of a journalist and his totally anonymous sources if the tale they tell sets off my bull meter.

[2xx1xy1JD]

Burris:

Slightly OT - but how do we best get people who have been mislead/brainwashed to hate to realize that they've been fed a lot of propaganda and need to seriously examine everything that they've ever been told? Especially in the context of national/ethnic conflict?

[docmom]

I think you start with someone you trust. My father used to believe the anti-gay propaganda. I remember in high school saying that we had been learning about homosexuality and that I thought treatment of gay people was abhorent. He said that while we shouldn't treat people badly, gay men shouldn't be teachers because they recruit little boys. I showed him some evidence that gay men were no more likely to be pedophiles than straight men. It actually started to change his thinking. He discovered that some people he knew were gay and he realized that gay people don't have horns and tails and are really just like everyone else (huge revelation). He's now completely converted but it was a process- debunk the myths, meet real live gay people, let go a firmly entrenched belief. Yelling at him that he was crazy wouldn't have worked.

[FoxyMoxie]

I think there's probably a lot of truth to that. In that same vein, I never hear gluttony preached about. Too many fat Americans I think, including a lot of preachers. My last SBC preacher had a huge gut. He would sweat profusely, I used to worry he was gonna have a heart attack.

Gee thanks for the fatphobia. Gluttony does not equal fatness, and fatness does not equal gluttony. I was at a steady weight before I started my lifesaving medication, but apparently my fatness is due to gluttony, good to know. I know in the Kristina thread formergothardite was using it as an example of fundie thinking, but it sounds like you actually agree with it. Gluttony is an attitude of the heart, and is about being greedy in a way which deprives others. Nothing to do with weight. And others' health is none of your business.

[jerkit]

I feel like Ken and Lori are causing us to turn on each other.

[sol]

I genuinely mean no disrespect, but could please explain this?

none taken :). i want to preface this by saying i came out pre-Ellen in a non-western culture and have spent most of the ensuing decades outside of the US. my familiarity with queer theory is, therefore, limited, and i'm not always sure if i'm using the right terminology or even if i have all of the concepts straight.(pun intended) i also hadn't given much thought to the idea of gender (beyond being very uncomfortable with rigid gender roles) until very recently. in fact, this discussion has triggered some serious reflection.

i'm biologically female, as is my partner. i'm also gay/lesbian/queer. i'm not trans, and i have never felt that i'm in the wrong body. according to some of the things i've read, that makes me cisgender. other things i've read find a trans-cis binary to as problematic as hetero-homo one. i don't personally don't believe gender is binary, and i don't feel comfortable being put in the same box with women (regardless of sexuality) who conform to what society deems feminine. maybe that makes me genderqueer... i know that as a child, i experienced some abuse because of my inability (and lack of desire) to look and behave like a girl was supposed to. i don't think those issues were related to my sexuality, rather they were about gender expression. i don't know if any of this make sense...i'm still sorting it out in my head, so it may just be a bunch of babble.

i also wanted to mention how cool it is to see people using gender-neutral language and being incredibly open-minded and respectful. (i'm totally fine with the pronouns "she" and "her", btw.) we've faced a lot of ugliness and discrimination these last few years, and it's touching in a way that i could never explain to come here and encounter such kindness and openness.

ETA: Quote from Eleanor Roosevelt

after seeing who she chooses to quote, i can't help but think that BrownieMomma either doesn't consider "homosexual activity" (or whatever she called it) a sin or that she doesn't have a problem with sinners. :lol:

[lawlifelgbt]

I don't understand people who still think homosexuality is a sin. As I said upthread, I love my wife, so I'll take the OMGHELLBURNINGFOREVER, if that is even the case (and I don't think so). There's also a false equivalency that homosexuality is exclusively or mostly about sex. I'll tell you 98% of my "homosexuality" has nothing to do with sex acts. Instead, it's who I notice, who I married, who I hold hands with, live with, split chores with, and hope for kids with. Yes, I prefer different sex acts than browniemomma and some Christians, but that's not the focus. Do you look at a straight couple and immediately think of them having sex? Yet, that's done with same-gender couples.

I saw a cool news story I'll link here for purposes of analogy:

http://www.msnbc.com/rachel-maddow-show ... n-t-shirts

BrownieMomma and some other people I know (not singling you out!) need this for your brains. And I want to tell you: "Was dein Gehirn kannst, kannst du auch. Wir helfen dir, dich von Homophobia zu loeschen." (I've changed some language to be applicable here).

Just try to see me as a person and not think about how I have sex and it's SO GROSS and sinful every time you see me post.

[formergothardite]

Burris:

Slightly OT - but how do we best get people who have been mislead/brainwashed to hate to realize that they've been fed a lot of propaganda and need to seriously examine everything that they've ever been told? Especially in the context of national/ethnic conflict?

They have to be open to learning. And that is the biggest problem. You can show them all day long. It can come from people they love and trust, but if they are determined to only view things one way and to believe the propaganda they have been fed, they aren't going to change.

[nelliebelle1197]

Please read this and tell me how this person, who has also made statements about how she would have rather homeschooled her children than have them in the "ghetto" school they were in and how she did not care if anyone thought she was racist with that statement - is merely stating what she has been taught and not that she feels that the sin of homosexuality is a lesser sin than the sin of adultery cause de gayz obviously can't have children.

Thanks in advance.

Sorry, I have seen several comments from this poster that set off little alarms and this one just sealed it.

[Burris]

Burris:

Slightly OT - but how do we best get people who have been mislead/brainwashed to hate to realize that they've been fed a lot of propaganda and need to seriously examine everything that they've ever been told? Especially in the context of national/ethnic conflict?

There isn't one single answer, I think; it would take a few changes in how kids are educated to prevent anymore of this.

It wasn't until 2013, on this very board, while explaining to a younger Croat -me, Serb- just what the hell we did, that I'd written anything about it (except I did file a short account at the ICTY in 1996).

I have spent a long time trying to figure it out - I mean, regardless of what some people believe, l do have a conscience - and so did most of the other people who, uh, 'policed' the 'investigation centres.'

It was only after I had returned home, and had been there awhile, that I was watching a news report on a battle I was all too familiar with and heard the perky journalist spin it into a heroic victory with minimal civilian casualties.

In truth, our forces surrounded a small enclave, exchanged fire only briefly before the people risked surrender.

Our forces rounded up and disarmed everyone, separated the men, bussed them to a nearby ravine, and shot them.

(What difference what I say now. I file a change of address with the ICTY whenever I move. I wait. But at this rate I'll be 80 and senile by the time they finally work their way down to me.)

Me: 'The media here is a government institution. If that story aired in that way, it happened because someone told them to say that...my God...what the hell else did they spin?'

I tuned into BBC radio, which was no problem for me because I had been learning English since I started school. Most of my comrades couldn't speak English - couldn't go elsewhere for the news.

Before the wars started, there were news broadcasts complete with terrible - and as it turns out, totally misidentified pictures - claiming Croat partisans had invested a hospital and butchered literally dozens of Serbian infants. A lie.

They "reproduced quotations" of a Croatian politicians saying there would be no war if the Croats didn't want it. Another lie.

But I was 18 years old and joining the .JNA; it turns out I was an excellent marksman, and modified my issued M48 as a sniper rifle - so that's how I was classed.

ASIDE: The Serbian government found an ingenious way not to pay a great many of its veterans the correct pension by claiming many were actually on training exercises instead of in conflict. Awesome, no?

Anyway, I wasn't sure where they'd send me: "Perimeter guard at a concentration camp" honestly never occurred to me.

I was assigned to a checkpoint during third shift - the last of three rotating 12 hour shift...which means my direct superior was Krkan -commander of the most cruel shift at the camp.

(which, in this case, means 'among the cruelest people to pollute the human gene pool).

People who know me occasionally get up the courage to ask what the hell I was thinking.

For one thing, Krkan scared the shit out of me. (Fun fact: He only served 13 years in prison for his crimes.)

There were two Serb women inmates at the camp, and I did not want to be number three.

I was sort of insulated from the worst of it because my post was at the outermost perimeter - which means I only walked in when I absolutely had to.

But some people said they'd rather die than be like me. I told them, hey, if they ever find themselves in my position, they're welcome to shoot themselves.

Fighting armed soldiers sucks, but at least they had guns; I feel far less guilty for the fighting than I do for thst two-month period when I got to find out first hand what it means to be...that.

I was recovering from injuries when I got home, so I listened a lot to the BBC. And then I knew...holy fuck: Our government started this. Our government lied to us.

We weren't defending our families. We were ripping massive holes in the families of other people.

I had, up until 1996, kept in contact with some of the people who served in the camp proper. I told them what I found. And, with but one exception, they were either indifferent - 'Things like that happen in war' - or proud to have saved us all from diversity.

Why do I feel guilty when the others don't? Why the hell didn't I desert?

WHAT THE FUCK HAVE I BECOME?

I won't apologize for what I did. Not ever. I don't seek forgiveness for it.

Because I know some of what happened is so terrible that for me to apologize and ask forgiveness would, if possible, make me even more guilty.

I read the story Corrie Ten Boon wrote about how a former guard just waltzed right up to her, stuck out his hand, and asked her - a woman he didn't even remember - to forgive his cruelty from Nazi camp.

Ten Boon forgave him.

I would have broken his jaw then kicked him in the balls - not because he asked forgiveness, but because he expected it.

I've spent nearly 20 years producing educational material about genocide - the Rwandan genocide, genocide in Sudan. Genocide...everywhere.

The best answer I can give is this:

1) Kids should be taught critical thinking from the cradle.

2) I have a strong suspicion that part of the reason bystander syndrome exists, and why propaganda is so potent is that people who find themselves in situations like these have no prior experience in how to handle; they literally don't know what to do.

If ethics and ethical scenarios became part of a person's early training, they'll have more tools to handle a thing humanely when they finally do encounter a situation that requires moral action.

People are perfectly capable of living down to others' expectation.

I hope it works the other way as well.

[jerkit]

none taken :). i want to preface this by saying i came out pre-Ellen in a non-western culture and have spent most of the ensuing decades outside of the US. my familiarity with queer theory is, therefore, limited, and i'm not always sure if i'm using the right terminology or even if i have all of the concepts straight.(pun intended) i also hadn't given much thought to the idea of gender (beyond being very uncomfortable with rigid gender roles) until very recently. in fact, this discussion has triggered some serious reflection.

i'm biologically female, as is my partner. i'm also gay/lesbian/queer. i'm not trans, and i have never felt that i'm in the wrong body. according to some of the things i've read, that makes me cisgender. other things i've read find a trans-cis binary to as problematic as hetero-homo one. i don't personally don't believe gender is binary, and i don't feel comfortable being put in the same box with women (regardless of sexuality) who conform to what society deems feminine. maybe that makes me genderqueer... i know that as a child, i experienced some abuse because of my inability (and lack of desire) to look and behave like a girl was supposed to. i don't think those issues were related to my sexuality, rather they were about gender expression. i don't know if any of this make sense...i'm still sorting it out in my head, so it may just be a bunch of babble.

Thanks for taking the time to explain!