Male Presentation

The conversation that we had with the men of different sexual orientations was another interesting conversation we had in class. It was interesting to hear of their stories of acceptance and fitting into society. I was especially into this conversation because i've experienced the change of people around someone when they come out. Last year, my female cousin was getting ready to start her dress shopping for prom when she had a talk with her parents. In the talk she had came out that she was, in fact, lesbian. At first, her parent were in complete shock because they always seen her hanging out with other guys and, at one point, she had gone out with a guy. They quickly accepted who she was and no harm was done. However, telling the family was a completely different story. Some accepted her just like her parents, but others quickly scolded her about it. So, I was interested because i wanted to know was this a one time scenario with gay or lesbian people or not.

Throughout the conversation it taught me that many gay or lesbian people have a primary concern of their families as well. Many of whom have had experiences similar to my cousin. However, what disturbs me is how some people can be abused and physically or mentally scarred because of how their parents just can't seem to accept what their child prefers the same sex more than the opposite sex. Some cases people even get kicked out of their houses or even “banished” from their family. First of all, how can a kid (let's say he’s younger than 18) survive in this world? As children or even teens in this world, you can't survive without some kind of adult support in your life. Think about it. Children cannot pay taxes because in this country you typically have to be 18 to pay bills. Also, let's say you go to St Benedict's. The tuition is certainly not something that a typical middle wage teen can sustain. So, without help from parents, we can't continue furthering your education. With no parents to support you, you could have no education and no basic needs to keep a satisfactory life. Basically, the parents destroyed his or her life all because of who they are not satisfied with what they are interested in.

The second thing i was interested in is the types of sexual orientations. Before this presentation, i thought that it was just heterosexual, homosexual, and bisexual people in the world. I mainly thought this because these are generally the three that make up most of the preferences of people. Now i know of all of these other sexual orientations are out there, like genderqueer, pansexual, and asexual people. Genderqueer being, as said on internationalspectrum.umich.edu, people possess identities which fall outside of the widely accepted sexual binary. Pansexual being having sexual preference for all identities. In addition, asexual being showing no preference whatsoever.