Let's go back to my high school years. I was completely asexual then, I had no sexual interest in men or women. As I said in my other post, I was attracted to guys not because I found them sexually attractive... For the last decade I lied to myself about that. But rather because I saw in them something I missed in myself. So I fantasized about BEING the jock guy, the popular guy, the muscular guy, the "hot dude" that worked at the mall, etc. I didn't think about getting it on with them, I just wanted to one day wake up and be them and leave my crappy life behind.
I wasn't accepted by most of my peers for being kinda a scrawny nerd in school. So being that I had no attraction to either sex, most of the straight guys assumed I was gay because I never had a girlfriend. That label kind of ended up sticking through my Air Force years, and I kind of started to wonder if maybe I was gay, especially after my first disastrous sexual experience. So because I didn't fit in with the straight dudes, I thought the gay community might be more accepting, and I thought that I would find someone easier to fill what I felt I was missing in myself.
So my last decade I've been lying to myself and all the guys I've been involved with. I was just using them because I felt like they were easy prey to get my psychological fix, in the end just hurting myself more by making me feel even worse about myself when I didn't somehow magically gain those qualities they had that attracted me to them, and then thinking that I could somehow be in a romantic relationship with a dude.
So I came out four times in my life, and each time I've had to deal with friction. I first came out as gay around 20 or 21, going to the clubs, joining the organizations, doing everything that was expected of me to do to "fit in".
For a time I was generally accepted (except those that didn't like people in the military), until I came out again, this time as a conservative/Republican (Full disclosure, I've never voted Republican for anything higher than state rep in the last decade other than participating in the primaries to hopefully get more socially moderate Republicans on the ballot). When I came out as a conservative, I got my fair share of sneers and attacks, people assuming automatically that I supported Bush (I did not), or that I wanted gays to stay second class citizens (I do not), or that I want people to just starve on the streets (I do not).
The third time I came out was as a g0y, which was short lived as I found them to be just as over the top as many of the gay men I despised for telling others who they should be and how they should live their lives. For those that don't know, g0ys are pretty much gay dudes that don't participate in penetrative (anal) sex for various reasons. So my fourth and final time coming out was when, with the help of a counselor and thinking long on who I truly am and where I want to go with my life, I decided to go straight.
So coming out, despite the rhetoric of some in the gay community, wasn't a positive experience for me. It led to more ostracism each and every time I revealed more about who I was. I was made to fear, instead of being liberated of my fear, because I constantly saw the abuse and attacks others in similar situations suffered at the hands of those gay scions who believe that everyone should just live their lives as they dictate.
So back to the original point, it's taken a decade, it's been a rough road, but I've finally come to accept myself as I am, I can now live without fear and concern about being rejected for who I am, because in the end the only person who's approval I need is my own. I'm fine with me, and if others are too, fantastic, and if you still have a problem with me, then there's nothing I can do or say that will change your opinion of me, and I will just have to accept that some people don't have the courage or respect to let others just be themselves. They have to tear others down to their level and make them feel like shit if they don't conform. Ironically, these same people complain about the straight world demanding conformity to gender roles and norms, all the while demanding that their gay brethren conform with the same narrow mentality of a evangelical preacher.
So this is for all of you who feel the same, who feel like you have no where to turn. This is also for those of you who feel that you have to dictate other people's lives for them and can't respect others for traveling a different life path and coming to different decisions about their own lives based on their own experiences.
