To my straight friends

Discussion in 'Gay & Lesbian Rights' started by fireballfl, Nov 5, 2015.

  1. fireballfl

    fireballfl New Member

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    Your son or daughter comes out of the closet, how would you react?

    (Gay counterparts, give everyone a chance to talk and explain their ideas)
     
  2. JakeJ

    JakeJ Well-Known Member Past Donor

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    What closet?

    Your message presumes a negative, the LGTB chip-on-the-shoulder mentality.

    I/we treat our children the same. The only response we would have would be to discuss potential obsticles and potential benefits of being gay, as we talk of those topics with our children about everything. Raising children is walking them down a path towards becoming an adult, which involves highly developed social and interpersonal skills on an individual nature.

    There are situations were not discussing sexuality is the wisest. There can be negative effects with some people, positive effects for doing so with others. For example, in much of academia staff will be more cautious and positive towards someone who is gay. There are curious considerations to being gay now in the military, which also is different for gay men and lesbian women. There are potential positives or at least safeguards to tacticly letting be known to be gay - as it exposes superiors to a charge of intimidation etc.
     
  3. verystormy

    verystormy Active Member

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    Pretty nonchalant - I would not expect them to come out as straight. No reason to want them to come out as anything other than happy decent humans.
     
  4. CausalityBreakdown

    CausalityBreakdown Banned at Members Request

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    You generally seem like a tolerant person on these matters, but you seem to overlook the conflict inherent in being an LGBT person in today's society. Institutions of prejudice exist, and every queer person is in conflict with them. A sort of war mentality is necessary for those who want to advance society, but even those who want to live a normal life need to prepare to encounter hardships.

    The closet is created by forces beyond our control.
     
  5. maat

    maat Well-Known Member Past Donor

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    I would not treat them differently other than how they can conduct themselves in my home. They would not be allowed to have partners in my home. They would not be allowed to have gay propaganda in my home. I would still love them and have a normal relationship without any acceptance of their sin/perversion.
     
  6. Johnny-C

    Johnny-C Well-Known Member

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    That's the problem with hypothetical scenarios, they are often oversimplified.

    I see the potential for several real difficulties, embedded in your answer above. There are complexities one would have to deal with one-on-one, hands-on; there are no easy or standard answers.
     
  7. maat

    maat Well-Known Member Past Donor

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    True, I'm not used to dealing with this scenario, so it would take time experience the associated issues. I do not care to address any individual differently in normal affairs based on their sins. We all sin. But, I would address the committing of that sin in my house. In other words, I would no more stand by and accept homosexual actions in my home anymore than allow my child to sleep unmarried with a Herero partner in my home.
     
  8. Johnny-C

    Johnny-C Well-Known Member

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    That's fair. It is likely that your values or religious beliefs would inject some amount of difficulty into things; that would not be unusual.

    I stopped seeing homosexuality as a sin per se; but I realize that others have not. Religion is a very personal thing; that's for certain.
     
  9. Anglicus

    Anglicus New Member

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    I would sit my children down and tell them about how evil and undemocratic the gay lobby really is. I, myself, am gay, and I find that almost every day there are militant nutters on the streets waving rainbow flags pretending that they have some right to represent all gays. They don't. And I would make sure that my children, if they were gay, would know to keep away from such people.
     
  10. Deckel

    Deckel Well-Known Member Past Donor

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    Were you ever in the closet to begin with? Just curious. There seems to be this pervasive attitude that every gay necessarily was in the closet and had to have some big fabulous coming out moment or needs to have one.
     
  11. Anglicus

    Anglicus New Member

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    Sort of. I never made a conscious decision to hide my sexual orientation; it's just that for a long time there was never an appropriate time to make it known. Anyone who asked me if I was gay got a true answer, but very few people ask that question. Essentially, I didn't see it as important enough to warrant a big 'coming out' ceremony.
     
  12. Deckel

    Deckel Well-Known Member Past Donor

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    Thanks for the information. It's not too late. If you have chocolate cream-filled doughnuts I might drop by for it :angel:
     
  13. Anglicus

    Anglicus New Member

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    If I had decided to go for a big occasion, I probably would have supplied lots of alcohol. Lower your audience's inhibitions, hit them with the news, and then let them confront it when they wake up in the morning with a hangover.

    Here's a question for you: if you had to list the various elements of who you are as a person on a piece of paper, would you include 'heterosexual' / 'straight'? Probably not. I think the same way regarding my homosexuality: it's not part of my identity.
     
  14. Deckel

    Deckel Well-Known Member Past Donor

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    My list would just say "Perfect" :icon_yoda:

    I have been having this discussion elsewhere about gay suicides. I think too many gays attribute all the ills they suffer with their sexuality. Sometimes you get fired because you are a sucky worker, not because you are gay.
     
  15. Anglicus

    Anglicus New Member

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    Of course, returning to my original point about some gays attempting to represent other gays, don't take me as the only example of gay people or as their representative; there are many who take their sexual orientation very seriously (too seriously if you ask me).
     
  16. JakeJ

    JakeJ Well-Known Member Past Donor

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    No question of it. Each situation is different and yes this can happen in families. Last month we helped a transsexual teen escape his family logistically, economically and psychologically. But we also helped another young teen do the same and it was not related to any sexuality issue. How many teenage girls have been thrown out of the house for getting pregnant? How many teens for not acting right for parents' religion. On and on and on.

    So I very much understand the topic but there are many ways to look at it and each situation is different. For example, some teens go out of their way to thrust their differences into their parents face, to deliberately be provocative, to be overly sensitive and so forth. There are many things kids "keep in the closet," such as smoking pot, having sex, etc.

    Whichever it is, what parents should always do is lead their children towards independent adult lives successfully. This included when to raise topics, when not to, what to reveal about yourself, what not to, in relation to situations and other people - and 10,000 other realities and tactics of life. Our own social presentations of ourselves are quite different from the actual realities of who we are. That all seems common sense.

    So yes, I understand how difficult and harmful it can be for gay teens in relation to parents. But I don't think this is a unique situation in terms of rejection and condemnations by parents. The greater harmful situation teens are in when there is true intense psychological and physical abuse.
     
  17. Polydectes

    Polydectes Well-Known Member

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    I personally think it's impossible to know how you would be or how you would feel until confronted with the situation.

    Before I told my parents about my sexual preferences, I studied accounts from other parents and they ranged from parents being so furious they told their children they were dead to them to parents blaming themselves, to parents not saying it's a big deal.

    I wanted to be prepared to deal with anything, and also be able to tell my parents they didn't do anything wrong. But none of that happened. I don't know if they internalized it or what. Just about six months later my mother told me that she wasn't disappointed. It wasn't so important if she was being honest or not, it was that she was making an effort.

    I had many years to accept it they haven't. Where things are not exactly perfect, they are making an effort and I appreciate that.

    I wish things could go back to the way they were before they knew, but I have no negative things to say about when I told them.

    Further I don't think anybody can know how they would react, they may have all these ideas, I did too, but the reality is different.
     
  18. JakeJ

    JakeJ Well-Known Member Past Donor

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    It very common for people to search for anyway to blame anyone and anything else for their problems and to exaggerate words, actions and looks by others to do so.

    As a different matter, psychologically one way to make something a big deal is to act like it is a big deal in a negative context. USUALLY parents figure out their kid's secrets and often just let is slide, figuring their child/teen will tell them when they are ready to, because the parents really don't see it as a big deal, or just don't want to address it.

    Though for some very obvious reasons it understood there would be no absolutely no negative reaction by us, when we faced the "coming out" statement our response was, "yeah, we've known that for at least 3 years." The response back was a somewhat frustrated "you know everything I do, don't you?" And the answer back, "yes we do, but we don't say anything unless we need to, which bring up the topic of you secretly loaning your car to someone last weekend. You remember what we told you about that. Do it again and you lose the car for a month." We then continued to talk about our view of who to come out to and who not to for practical and tactical considerations.

    That was not any punitive reaction to "coming out," but there could be some teens who would translate it that way.

    Sometimes, even if parents and relatives may not be entirely agreeable to their kid or a relative being gay, having some big announce occasion probably often is not the right way to handle it, just like it generally would be unwise for a 17 year old to announce/"come put" at the family thanksgiving dinner by standing up saying: "I want everyone to know I'm having sex with my girlfriend." If you call upon people to review your actions and judge you, don't be surprised if they do.

    That is another curious aspect is if a 15 year old "comes out," is the parents not only hearing "I'm gay," they also are hearing (or think they are hearing) an unspoken "I'm having sex," which is entirely not acceptable to them.
     
  19. JakeJ

    JakeJ Well-Known Member Past Donor

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    All parents are different and their concerns could be many. What about grandchildren? What about AIDS? What will other relatives say? Their teen is having sex? Concerns of the former secrecy etc. And overall their vision of their kid's future maybe shattered. Again, often it may be better to sort of let the parents figure it out across time or at least have their suspicions, rather than cold cocking them with it.
     
  20. perotista

    perotista Well-Known Member Past Donor

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    I'd ask them what they were doing in the closet in the first place. Smoking pot, trying to hid some incriminating evidence, maybe to just get some peace and quiet.
     
  21. CRUE CAB

    CRUE CAB New Member

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    He she would no longer be my child.
     
  22. JakeJ

    JakeJ Well-Known Member Past Donor

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    "In my home" is an entirely different topic, isn't it? Though old fashioned, we have a "not in our home" stance as well even if adults and not married - hetero or gay. The reasons are not moral or religious reasons. It has to do with "in our home." "Our home" means a great deal to us. Like it or not, fair or unfair, we make the rules of the house and have no need to rationalize or justify those rules. They are the rules because they are the rules.
     
  23. JakeJ

    JakeJ Well-Known Member Past Donor

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    No suprise from you. We have come across parents like your message. A few times, their child in a sense becomes our child for the teen and as a wall then between that teen and the parent(s). It can take some time for those teens to psychologically equally be able to completely write off their parents from their lives and move on in their lives and into adulthood. It is a process they have to be lead thru as such parents overall generally were not good parents failing to otherwise prepare their children for adult life.

    We are currently walking 2 teens thru this, one of those about being a transsexual and the not sexuality related but abuse related. For both, their fathers had been such a dominating bully all their lives they lacked psychological ability to stand up to him and both were literally shocked to see us do so ourselves, that anyone could get back in his face rougher than he did to them - and shocked we could walk away from him like he was absolutely nothing. Now we have to teach them self empowerment and somewhat rapidly rewalk them thru their childhood such as nuturing and responsibility to adulthood. It takes about a year to walk them thru about 8 years old to high school maturity.

    Usually it is the father, with the mother being so dominated she just has to go along with it. Men who bully their children bully their wives. It is difficult to convince those teens they can't rescue or help their mother and (moreso) their siblings that they worry about, they have to take care of themselves now. We explain when each of their siblings is old enough, they'll then be ready to rescue them in the same process they are going thru. Those siblings do better because they saw their older sibling escape and know their day to do the same will come - so they have hope. It is only about being gay when it is, but it would have happened about anything eventually anyway because the fathers are control freaks who see children as their servants and slaves, deliberately keeping them psychologically as children never growing up.

    To those parents it is all only about themselves and how children serve their purposes, not what is best for the childrens' future. That is what you really just said. Your child exists for you, not themselves.

    What about fornication? Would a fornicating child no longer be your child? Do you have a "no longer my child" list? Drugs? Alcohol? Cigarettes? Sex? Bad grades in school? Caught shoplifting?
     
  24. CRUE CAB

    CRUE CAB New Member

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    We had a boy, raised a man. End of story. As it should be.
     
  25. Johnny-C

    Johnny-C Well-Known Member

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    Consider your dreams fulfilled. It's not like that for every parent; some things you are powerless to affect.
     

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