As a woman who struggled with her sexuality all her life until very recently (in terms of figuring it out, I’m still struggling because of homophobia lol), I just want questioning women to know that if you’ve been pondering on it for a long, long, long ass time, and it causes you genuine pain and distress when you tell yourself “I’m not bi/a lesbian”, I’m pretty sure you’re not straight.
A huge part of homophobic manipulation against gay women, is to convince them that their love for women is lesser than their love for men (even when we don’t genuinely have it in the case of lesbians), it’s to find every possible way as to why this or that discounts what is obvious attraction to other women.
If you feel within yourself the words “I want to be bi” or “I want to be a lesbian”; I’m pretty sure you are.
How many straight women do you know that hold enough respect for gay women’s identities that they’re willing to suffer in confusion and loneliness for years?
Which straight woman would want to be bi/a lesbian THAT badly that it causes her genuine pain to think she’s not really one? It’s not like being gay grants us any benefits that straight women would DIE for. Literally the only thing in it for any woman is the opportunity to be with women, so if you’re in pain for thinking you’re straight, you’re in pain because you think you’ll never be able to love and be with other women.
Out bi and lesbian women who’re usually sure of their identities and who live their lives as gay women do also question whether they’re “faking” it or not, and it causes us tremendous distress to feel that maybe we’re fakes! Which is clearly something you share with us.
Those aren’t straight feelings. Stop picking yourself apart so much. The only requirement to be a gay woman is to want to be with women.
Welcome home, my loves.
Out of all my posts that could’ve ended up being reblogged by TERFs…
Anyway, REGARDLESS of your gender assignment at birth, this goes for you. If you’re a trans woman, or you’re thinking you may be a trans woman. Everything I said above applies to you too.
Some girls realize that they’re girls when they realize that the way they love girls is not how men do it, and that is a beautiful, amazing thing.
Some girls have already realized and accepted that they are girls, but comp het is 100% inflicted upon trans women too. Being bi or a lesbian already makes cis women feel like Not Real Women, so it can be so hard for trans women to realize that they may not be straight, when society teaches us that, in its terms, being a woman is intrinsically tied to being exclusively attracted to men and any deviation from that puts you in, at best, a gray area.
If you’re seeing yourself in lesbian/bi women’s literature much more than you ever would in straight or bi men’s, that means something. If you project yourself on gay women characters, it means something.
If you feel heartbroken thinking that you want to be with women in the way women are with other women, but that you can’t be, that’s a sign that you actually CAN be and ARE.
None of these feelings are the feelings of a straight woman OR of a man of any sexuality. Thing like these are women’s experiences; trans lesbian/bi women’s experiences.
This is also your home in spite of what some monsters have to say about it, and the rest of us welcome and love you too.
Hey, guys, if you’re gonna reblog this post, I rather you do it with this addition, since the first one didn’t address trans gay girls the way it should have.
The
Buzzfeed article was titled “This Man Invited People To A “BBQ Not
Orgy” On Grindr And It Was Surprisingly Heartwarming.” It’s about how
Chris Bowman, a 61 year old man from Apex, North Carolina has been hosting an
annual summer BBQ. He advertises this BBQ through the gay dating/hookup app,
Grindr. It’s about how the event is surprisingly sweet and Bowman, who is a
recovered alcoholic, wants to give back to the community and bring people
together.
TL;DR
Chris is a registered sex offender with a history of pedophilia and preying on
young people. His ‘not an orgy’ and community talk is a gaslighting tactic to
groom young people into having sex with him. Buzzfeed, Vice, and other social
media outlets giving his event a platform endangers LGBT youth.
A
group of four of us (J, M, S, and A) attended the BBQ in the summer of 2017. J received
an invite similar to the one shown in the Buzzfeed article over Grindr, and we’re
young and dumb so we decided what the hell, let’s go. We rolled up and saw a fire
truck and ambulance already there. He’d invited the local fire department and
EMS to attend the BBQ. The food was admittedly very good, and the crowd was a
strange mix of after-church and from Grindr. Most of the other folks at the BBQ
seemed fine and kind. Buzzfeed got that right. Here is what they left out:
More
information about his charges & appeal: Click Here
1997:
Chris is giving Daniel, a 14 yo boy, a golf lesson. He locks the doors to the
store and turns off the lights. He comes up behind Daniel under the impression
of adjusting the child’s technique. He reaches down into Daniel’s underwear and
molests him.
1998:
Chris’s daughter has two friends over for a slumber party. They are sisters.
When everyone is asleep, Jessica, a 15 yo girl, is walking down the stairs of
his multi-level house. Chris approaches, pulls down her shorts, and performs
oral sex on her. He stops when Jessica’s sister stumbles upon the scene.
2005:
Chris provides his house as a location for two friends, a 24 yo and 18 yo, to
have sex with their underage girlfriends, 14 yo and 15 yo.
He
appealed his 2005 convictions that testimony from 1997 & 98 was inadmissible
in the determination of guilt phase of his trial.
THE BBQ
Chris
knew who we were and immediately inserted himself into our group. We figured,
yeah we’ll talk with him a while—he gave us all this food, so we kind of have
to (!!THIS IS HIS STRATEGY!!). Anyway, we listened to him talk about orgies,
sex, golf, and drugs in Europe for about an hour. Topics he hit:
-
Orgies he’d attended in downtown Paris where you
circled the arc de triumph in your car until forming a chain of other searching
cars that would eventually peel off into a warehouse or somewhere to initiate
the orgy. It’s cool you, should totally try it sometime! OKAY.
-
He talked a lot about how his favorite drug to use was
Black Beauty
-
He talked a lot about how good the golfing was in
Scotland (He molested a 14 yo boy in 1997 while teaching a golf lesson!)
-
He spent a lot of time trying to convince us to
attend the “BBQ After Dark”
The
heat was incredible that day and we were starting to get tired of his weird sex
talk. Chris saw this and asked J what was wrong. J told him it was just kind of
hot. Chris followed up by inviting J to go on and take his shirt off. J said
no, he was fine. Chris said, “Oh no, come on! Take your shirt off! I’ll take my
shirt off!” J ignored it. We were all uncomfortable. Throughout the ENTIRE
event, Chris constantly reminded us about the after dark portion of the BBQ,
which we were all very invited to. We had no plans of going, but kept our
refusals soft and polite out of respect, because again, the BBQ is a tactic to
make you treat him kinder and feel bad about thinking he’s creepy.
THE NEXT DAY
This
was when the solicitations started. For the next year and a half until J
deleted his Grindr last fall, Chris continued to send J messages trying to move
things forward. He also tried to pick up A and S through J’s Grindr. He’s
talked about how he’s really excited about the buzz the event has been getting
and how he’s hoping the event will grow and grow. J hasn’t responded to the
messages that have kept coming for over a year. Attached are a few screenshots.
CONCLUSION
We
tried to contact Buzzfeed after the article was first published about how they
had misrepresented the nature of the event. When they didn’t respond, we didn’t
think it mattered too much. Maybe we were being too critical? The food was good…
However, now that we are aware of Chris’s history of pedophilia, we want to
make sure anyone who decides to attend knows what to expect.
I really would like anyone who’s reblogged the original version of the post to reblog this one. The original one (with over 300k notes) has too many variations of this story. NO ONE should attend this man’s bbq. He’s a pedophile that grooms young boys on grindr and at his “Pure” BBQ. The evidence is all here.
Stop telling yourself that the grass is greener on the other side, because it’s not. It is greener where you water it. So take control of your life and start watering your own pastures and grow your own greener grasses.
