I want to talk about the sexy topic of monogamy. No so much whether monogamy is achievable or whether it goes against our natural inclinations. The internet is littered with that stuff.  Is monogamy impossible? Are men designed to cheat? There are whole books dedicated to the topic: Eric Anderson's "The Monogamy Gap: Men, Love, and the Reality of Cheating" and the bestselling "Sex at Dawn: How We Mate, Why We Stray, and What It Means for Modern Relationships" by Chris Ryan and Cacilda Jetha,  to name a few.

Call me cynical but you know what I get from these articles?  Maybe it’s not so much monogamy that’s impossible, maybe its lifetime relationships. Only having sex with one person may be no problem for a period of time, but when everything that one person does begins to drive you nuts - that’s the problem. Maybe we just aren’t designed to be with one person our whole life, because, let’s face it, people get annoying. But apparently I’m jaded…

What I actually want to talk about is monogamy assumption. Rather, I suppose I want to learn about monogamy and try to understand why it is so often assumed in (largely heterosexual ) relationships. I have been out of the dating circuit for almost a decade, so perhaps something changed while I was busy doing whatever it is one does in a monogamous relationship: taking Friday night walks through Home Depot, shopping for furniture, having scheduled sex. Maybe I have just been ill-informed by damaging television shows such as Sex and the City but I thought single people dated. A lot. I thought single people went out on multiple dates with multiple people. And not even just people who were looking for relationships; people who didn’t want anything serious too, I thought they dated as well.

"In fact, based on my limited findings, it would seem that straight people at least prefer monogamy."

When I started paying attention and asking around, I realized that people do in fact date, but most people don’t date multiple people at the same time. Why, you might ask? Well, the most common answer I’ve gotten is that people aren’t comfortable sleeping with more than one person at a time. In fact, based on my limited findings, it would seem that straight people at least prefer monogamy. And since, if you’re lucky, dating often leads to sex, people therefore tend to only date one person at a time.

 I recognize that this little “study” is extremely limited, but I’m hard pressed to find many people who feel differently.  It seems that even if people are dating multiple people, once they find someone they like, they stop dating the others. Which leaves me questioning- what if you like them all? What if you’re dating multiple people and you like all of them? What if you are sleeping with all of them? What if they’re sleeping with other people? What if they’re assuming you’re monogamous? Which leads me to my next question:

When do you have the monogamy discussion?

Is it the first date? First time you have sex? First time you say “I love you”? It seems to me, from my own experience, from my friends’ experiences, and from my inevitable exposure to pop culture, that exclusitivity is assumed from the beginning- at the very latest from the first time you have sex. Where does this come from, I wonder? Is this bred into us? Is it “natural” to assume once we are having sex with someone they aren’t having sex with anyone else? Are we taught this through pop culture? When did sex suddenly equal exclusivity? And furthermore, how did I miss this?

"Multiple studies suggest that monogamy is neither necessarily assumed nor the norm among gay male couples."  

So, I know this rant is slightly heteronormative. I am aware of this, since I can only truly speak from my own experience and my own interpretations of the world. I recognize that this is largely different among the LGBTQ community, particularly among gay men. Multiple studies, such as The Couples Study and Hoff’s survey of 566 gay male couples in the San Francisco Bay Area, suggest that monogamy is neither necessarily assumed nor the norm among gay male couples.  I’ve been lead to believe by my gay male friends that monogamy is not assumed until discussed.

So why is it so different among straight people? The obvious answer is that they are socialized that way, whereas queer people have always had to challenge “conventional” relationships.  Is the assumption of monogamy just another backwards thing we “breeders” do? Don’t get me wrong, I have nothing against monogamy, I just don’t want it forced on me or assumed, and I sure as hell don’t want to be judged for my aversion to it or mere desire to simply date. 

Last week I had the pleasure of attending a Forum on Harm Reduction put on by the Wellington-Guelph Drug  Strategy  (WGDS). I had just come from two long but productive days of doing grief work and dealing with multiple loss and trauma and was excited to focus on something else;  something lighter? I’m not sure what I expected but it was anything but lighter.

I was reminded of the same blaring lesson I am taught over and over in this line of work - there is a lot of fucking pain in this world and everyone is just doing what they can to survive given the tools that are available to them. This seems to me to be one of the common bonds we all share as human beings- we all struggle, we all suffer, we all try our best to carry on in whatever way we can - so why are we so judgmental of people on their journey?

Perhaps I should start with what exactly Harm Reduction is. Harm Reduction  is a term used to refer to a set of strategies to help someone avoid harms associated with substance use. This approach recognizes that not every person is able to or wants to stop using at the point of first contact with a service provider. The aim of harm reduction is to work towards less problematic substance use or abstinence and work towards realistic goals.

Sounds great, right? There’s just one problem- Harm Reduction is based on the principle that there is instrinsic value in all human beings - a value that is, unfortunately not shared by everyone. The unfortunate truth is that people who use drugs are often seen as the lowest of the low and deserving of their fate.  There is a similar belief held about people living with HIV, sex trade workers, and apparently even rape victims. These assumptions are not only erroneous, misinformed, and cold-hearted, they also come from a place of absolute privilege.

Pain is attached to any addiction. As Gabor Maté aptly puts it in, In The Realm of Hungry Ghosts: Close Encounters with Addiction,

“Not all addictions are rooted in abuse or trauma, but I do believe they can all be traced to painful experience. A hurt is at the centre of all addictive behaviours. It is present in the gambler, the Internet addict, the compulsive shopper and the workaholic. The wound may not be as deep and the ache not as excruciating, and it may even be entirely hidden—but it’s there. As we’ll see, the effects of early stress or adverse experiences directly shape both the psychology and the neurobiology of addiction in the brain.”

Despite this, addictions have a hierarchy in our society. This hierarchy has less to do with the actual dangers of the drug than who is the population iassociated with using the drug. Simply put, “the whiter and wealthier the population, the more acceptable is the substance. And profit.” (Maté, 2008).

This mentality is likely behind the reason that Naloxone (opiate inhibitor used to prevent opioid overdoses) is not readily available in Ontario. Naloxone is an inexpensive (about $12/kit), easy-to-use, effective way to save someone from an opiate overdose. It has no addictive properties and can last up to 45 minutes (enough time to get someone emergency help). Despite its low cost and life-saving properties, Naloxone still must be prescribed by a physician.

Why, you might ask, is such a inexpensive and life-saving medication not widely available, especially to people who use drugs? There are all kinds of political and structural issues. But if you ask me, the main reason is social exclusion. People don’t care about drug users (or people with mental health problems, or people with HIV, or street-involved people, or poor people…)

Even though a large number of people who overdose on prescription drugs overdosed on their own prescription, there is still a stigma attached to drug users that they are for some reason less worthy of life than other non-drug using people. This stigma is based in a lack of understanding of the connection between trauma and substance use (and mental health),  as well as the systemic barriers that cause people to use drugs in the first place and prevent them from accessing help.

There are countless resources out there that support my point, but I’m tired of trying to make this argument in a way that is respectful and articulate, only to fall on deaf ears. Instead, I’m just going to tell you why you are an asshole if you don’t believe people who use drugs deserve help.

1. If you believe this, you’re cold. I mean COLD.  People who use drugs are human beings - do we all not deserve the right to life? If you’re pro-life but don’t believe in social services and support to help keep existing people alive - you’re a fucking hypocrite.
2. You’re privileged- maybe you have been fortunate enough to never have experienced trauma or loss, or financial struggle, or housing instability, or lack of familial support. Maybe you were given a better set of coping skills than lots of other people. Perhaps you have never experienced severe  physical or emotional pain and needed something to dull that pain. Perhaps you were lucky enough to not be born with a mental health issue.  Maybe you aren’t effected by stress. Maybe you have never needed an escape. If you haven’t experienced any of this, you are fortunate, perhaps even lucky, but certainly not better than anyone else and no more deserving of life just because of your luck.
3. Drug users are people too. Maybe even people you love or will love. They are your brother, your mother, your cousin, your friend, your coworker, your partner, your child, your neighbourm, the majority of whom are good people too. Yes, there are “bad” drug users, just as there are “bad” people who don’t use drugs; one does not determine the other.
4. Supporting harm reduction idoes not mean you condone drug use. You condone reducing harm to people who may not be ready or able to quit using drugs. I condone the use of seatbelts, but that does not mean I condone or want people to get into car accidents.
5. “Why should my tax money go toward drug users?” Well, because for one, drug users are people.  Secondly, this argument sucks. If I don’t have kids, why should my tax money go toward the public school system? I (have the privilege to) eat healthy and exercise, so why should my tax money go toward treating heart related diseases?
6. “Having naloxone readily available will just tempt people to test their limits”- As Waterloo Region Crime Prevention Council’s Michael  Parkinson points out “you don’t see people going for the peanut pad thai just because they have an epi pen”. 

If you still don’t care about people and only about money, prevention is a hell of a lot cheaper than treatment.

Enough said?

Warning- this post talks about vaginas and pornography and contains some slightly explicit language. Gasp! Anyone who is squeamish, uptight, or related to me can just stop reading right now. Consider yourselves warned.

Lately, I’ve been having a lot of conversations about sex, or should I say a lot more than usual.

Actually, a large portion of these said conversations have been about pornography. I’m not sure how the conversation always seems to go there. Perhaps it is because I’ve been thinking about it a lot more since I took a pornography course during my Masters (expect to see future posts about this). I don’t know, maybe everyone is just dying to talk about porn. I like to think it’s just because I’m relatively open and people feel comfortable talking to me, but I doubt it. More likely it has to do with alcohol. Regardless, somehow the conversation ends up on pornography. Unfortunately, they’re not usually exciting conversations about what we’re into or what kind of porn we prefer.

Lately, the conversation has ended up about pornography as sex ed. Can and should it be used as an educational tool? What effect does watching porn have on one’s sexual development, and of course, is pornography beneficial to women?

Let me back this up to another conversation I have been having most of my adult life, but especially a lot more lately: vagina confidence. Recently a girlfriend and I were talking about how difficult it is for many women to love their vaginas; as well we were discussing the increasingly popular phenomenon of labiaplasty and vaginal rejuvenation.

While vaginal rejuvenation may sound like a relaxing treatment at some kind of vagina spa, it actually refers to the surgical tightening of the vagina. Labiaplasty, sometimes known as labia reduction, is plastic surgery of the labia (minora or majora), for aesthetic (although sometimes health) reasons and is a growing business these days. One source purports that in the US, this industry is worth $6.8m and that in 2008 in the UK, operations were up 70% compared to the previous year. Vagina modification is a booming business; extremely lucrative for the surgeons, potentially damaging for the recipients. Read any forum and you will find just as many women who are unhappy with the surgery than who are pleased. Besides being super expensive ($2,000+), vaginal cosmetic surgeries can result in infection, loss of sensation, lengthy and painful recovery time, deformities, and permanent scarring, among other “side effects”.

So why, you ask, are so many women willing, even begging, to have this surgery in order to achieve a “designer vagina”?

Many people, including myself, blame pornography and the increasing social acceptance of and access to pornography (although not exclusively). It pains me greatly to say this because I have, for a large portion of my adult life, been an advocate for pornography as positive for women. I do think that porn can be really beneficial for women. Hear me out. Granted, there are tones of different types of pornography, much of which is extremely violent or degrading toward women, which obviously can have the opposite effect. For purposes of this blog, I’m referring mostly about “mainstream” pornography- which generally means predominately Caucasian, largely heterosexual porn (including most “girl-on-girl” as well) all of which of course can still be violent and/or degrading. There are whole other blogs needed to discuss these other categories, as well as the effects “mainstream” pornography can have on people who do not necessarily fit these categories.

Generally speaking, in a society that teaches women to be sexually passive, I think it is good for women to see other women actively enjoying sex, even demanding what they want/like. Porn is a great medium to allow this and to teach women that it is perfectly okay to enjoy sex. Too bad these women are still viewed as social deviants (aka sluts). Unfortunately, because so much of porn is catered to men’s fantasies, it can often really lack in this element of (genuine) female enjoyment (note the absence of the female orgasm in much porn, particularly from cunnilingus).

Sometimes porn can even function in the opposite manner, as will be discussed, teaching women that they should like things that many women don’t, such as cum on the face. Sure, there may be a time and a place, but may I just say - the money shot on the face is not a given and should not be happening unless you ask for it! (also suggesting a need for examples of healthy open communication in porn as well). But I digress.

This is the problem with porn. It has such potential to be educational and positive, but also so much potential to be very damaging. Back to this discussion of “vagina confidence”, I used to think that porn was a great medium for women to see other women’s vaginas and realize that everyone’s is different. Unless you fool around with women, or are super close with your female friends, chances are you haven’t seen many vaginas in real life, given the way our anatomy works. Watching porn could really help women who may be insecure to realize that their vagina is perfectly normal and that there is no “perfect” vagina. However, porn is screwing that up too. With the increases in labiaplasty among porn stars and Playboy’s persistent airbrushing of labia (I read they had a policy against showing labia), we are moving closer and closer to the “designer vagina”; the one-size-fits-all, “flawless”, completely unrealistic vagina. Similarly to how we have an ideal image of the female body, which is completely unobtainable for most women, we now have one of the ideal vagina too. Even one of our largest sources of pleasure is under public scrutiny and judgment. Is nothing sacred anymore? Not even our vaginas?

I recently read a study that surveyed over 400 students in England, aged 14 to 17, about pornography. Apparently, according to this survey, the average teenager claims to watch up to 90 minutes of porn a week. When shown photographs of 10 pairs of breasts, both boys and girls tended to prefer images of surgically enhanced breasts to “normal” breasts. Similarly, they were largely disgusted or shocked by hair between women’s legs. Many girls admitted to having started shaving their genitals because they believed boys expected them to.

Not surprisingly boys also revealed insecurities about the size and shape of their penises, as well as anxiety around performance.

I find this disturbing. What is going to become of a generation of boys and girls raised on porn? While I don’t think this is so much a new phenomenon for boys, I’m guessing that porn as first sex education for girls is increasing. Does this mean girls will grow up thinking shaved vaginas, bleached assholes, augmented breasts, anal, and cum on the face are all a standard, preferred part of sex? How about the fact that virtually no one in porn uses condoms? What chance do our messages of safer sex that my colleagues and I work so hard to promote stand against pornography’s blaring message- unprotected sex is better (and normal)?

And now when girls turn to porn, possibly hoping they will see something that resembles their own, they will find “artificial” vaginas as well. Why wouldn’t they surgically change theirs? Combine that with the countless advertisements that scream at young girls that they are not pretty enough, sexy enough, skinny enough, big breasted enough, tanned enough, etc. and we wonder why so many girls have self-confidence issues.

We are making it practically impossible for women to truly enjoy sex. How are women supposed to “get into it” when not only are we taught that good girls don’t like sex (or shouldn’t admit to it), but we are also too preoccupied with what our ass, hips, breasts, thighs, and now vaginas look like? Perhaps that is the point?

Despite all this, I really do believe that porn can be positive, for the aforementioned reasons. Maybe there just needs to be more amateur porn; real people with real bodies having real sex. Maybe we need to be more open about our sexuality as a society; show more pictures of vaginas. Maybe as women we need talk more openly about vaginas.

We certainly need to nurture confidence among our girls. Perhaps sex ed in school should include various images of various bodies, including genitals. Maybe not being so uptight about even using the word “vagina” would be a start. I’m not entirely sure, but I, for one, am disgusted that girls have yet another insecurity to add to the list. So please, for heaven’s sake, unless you are getting us off- keep your mitts off our muffs. 

As you may recall from a recent post of mine, I've been quite surprised by the strength and resilience among our community to challenge homophobia. After delivering a series of workshops on homophobia to youth, I was shocked at how willing these youth were to engage with issues surrounding homophobia and how able they were to understand the connections between experiencing homophobia and HIV risk.

At AIDS Service Organizations like ours, we are now seeing this connection more and more in our line of work and we're really beginning to understand the consequences that experiencing homophobia can have on LGBTQ individuals' health. Particularly, experiencing homophobia can significantly increase one’s risk of HIV infection, as well as increase the burden of disease for those living with HIV. Research is now showing that those who experience homophobia in forms such as isolation, bullying, exclusion, and violence, may have a lessened sense of self-worth or self-esteem, which can lead to an increase in the likeliness of partaking in “risky behaviours”, which in turn can lead to an increased risk of HIV transmission.

Realizing this connection, the agency I work for, AIDS Committee of Guelph (ACG) wanted to develop a resource targeting youth that would help prevent HIV transmission by increasing capacity to address homophobia, help resolve internalized homophobia, and increase knowledge on HIV transmission. But how could we do this in a way that would be fun and accessible?

Knowing that something like 90% of youth use cell phones, 60% of which use smart phones, what better way to disseminate this info but through an iPhone app? I have to hand it both to my predecessor and Executive Director - what a fabulous way to allow youth to access information in a confidential and fast way, using a tool that they spend the majority of their day on anyway!

This app functions to provide witty comebacks to homophobic slurs or phrases, as well as to answer questions and help dispel myths about HIV transmission that you may be too shy to ask your teacher, parent, or health care provider. It even has a quiz that rates your homophobia. Our aim is to provide accurate information that youth may feel too uncomfortable to find elsewhere, as well as to open up discussion and help build capacity to challenge homophobia.

As I mentioned in a previous post, Guelph is a relatively progressive town and may be more accepting of people’s sexual orientation in general than other regions. But that's not to say that people here don’t still experience homophobia. It’s also important to remember that homophobia can take on more subtle forms like the derogatory use of the word “gay”, or even as constant heteronormative images that infiltrate our daily lives. That's why it is important to recognize the effect all these different forms of homophobia can have on our lives and to be able to challenge them together, regardless of sexual orientation.

We hope this is precisely what our app, and the launch party we are having for it, will begin to do. Our app launch party takes place this Thursday January 31^st, 2013 upstairs at the Albion Hotel (49 Norfolk, Guelph, ON) at 8:30 pm and is a chance to try out the FREE app if you haven’t downloaded it already, to mingle, dance, maybe win some prizes, and to simply open up much needed discussion around homophobia and HIV. It's our hope that this app is another step toward challenging homophobia, increasing knowledge, and decreasing stigma and HIV transmission.

Come celebrate the release of this great app with us. See you at the party!

Recently, the wonderful editors at PositiveLite.com took some of the Toronto-area contributors out for a lovely holiday lunch. Somehow, the conversation moved, as it does, to fetishes, and Bob suggested (jokingly…I think) that I become the resident writer at PositiveLite.com on fetishes.

We laughed about it; the thought of a young (yeah, that’s right), somewhat vanilla woman who recently came out of a nine-year monogamous relationship writing about fetishes was a bit humourous. However, afterwards I got to thinking about, and consequently talking about, fetishes.

The more I read about and talked about fetishes, the more apparent it became how common they truly are.

Depending on one’s definition of fetish, I know people with shoe and foot fetishes (retifism), leather fetishes (doraphilia), and S&M fetishes. There are all kinds of fetishes; tree fetishes (dendrophilia), cross-eyed fetishes, watching people sleep fetishes (somnophilia), rubbing up against strangers fetishes (frotteurism), teddy bear fetishes (ursusagalmatophilia), licking one’s eyeballs fetishes (oculolinctus). The list goes on and on. You name it, if it exists; someone likely has a fetish for it.

I have good friends who are exhibitionists, and several who are voyeurists (I mean, who isn’t?). There are whole websites dedicated to specific fetishes for god’s sake, yet we rarely talk about them. I began to wonder: if fetishes are so common and such a regular part of human sexuality, then why are they still so taboo?

Granted, some fetishes are really, really out there. I tend not to “fetish knock” as a rule, but I draw the line at anything that harms another living creature (or defiles them when they are dead). I can only conclude that fetishes are so taboo largely because they are sexual in nature and our North American society has a very clearly defined idea of what is considered “normal sexuality”, even if it is anything but normal.

This concept of “appropriate” sexuality is constantly shoved in our faces. Whether it is movies, magazines, sex-ed, music videos, or conversations, we are taught from birth what sex should look like; heterosexual (predominantly Caucasian), attractive, and not “too freaky” and anyone who steps outside of this is considered a freak, transgressive, or dirty (and not necessarily in the good way).

However, if you ask me North American society’s idea of sex is far more bizarre than autonepiophilia (sexual pleasure derived from dressing up or imagining one’s self as an infant). We are a society that is obsessed with breasts, but who freaks-out about breast-feeding in public. We are a society that continually objectifies women and portrays them as overtly sexual (or not sexual at all), yet we scorn women for being promiscuous or even for knowing what they like sexually; we may even call them sluts. We are a society that pushes soft core sex in movies and advertisements, yet gets up in arms about pornography.

We are so obsessed with sex as a society, that we will buy virtually any product that promises to enhance our sex lives, yet we ostracize those who are open-minded enough to know what they want and to seek it out. Yet, for a society that is so obsessed with sex, we certainly are uptight about it. We push sex, but are afraid to have real conversations about it or believe that real people have sex in “unconventional” ways. We are sexual hypocrites. 

This is why anyone differing outside of this sexual “norm” faces so much stigma; the queer community, people living with HIV, people with fetishes. It is because of this “normalized sexuality” that people feel forced to stay in the closet for lifetimes. It is because of this view that young women feel obligated to say “yes” to sex even when they don’t want to because they think otherwise guys won’t like them. It is because of this view that I know numerous people living with HIV that were told they got what they deserved because they were being promiscuous. 

It is because of this view that people may not access health care services, or be completely honest with their doctors, for fear of judgment of their sexual practices. It is because of this view that people are unable to live totally fulfilling sex lives or ask their partners for what they want in bed. 

We are a sexually judgmental, and consequently, sexually repressed society and I, for one, am tired of it. So, next time you find out someone’s sexuality extends outside your concept of “normal”, please, don’t be so fucking judgmental. Take a good, hard look at what you’re into, and if it fits within “the norm” maybe you’re the one who should ask yourself, “Am I the one who is a freak?” Besides, how do you know you don’t like something like catheterophilia (sexual interest in the use of catheters) until you try it?

As part of my new position as Positive Prevention Coordinator at our local AIDS Service Organization (AIDS Committee of Guelph and Wellington County), I have been designing and conducting workshops for “at risk” youth on homophobia. This means youth who are perhaps street involved, recovering from substance use or who are young parents.

 The workshops are designed around a slideshow of homophobic and oppressive graffiti taken by participants in the area in order to facilitate discussion and to help challenge homophobia. However, when the photographers went in search of hateful and homophobic graffiti, they were surprised by how much graffiti they found with positive and supportive messages. Perhaps it is because we live in a relatively progressive little town, but this is telling of the capacity we possess as a community to challenge homophobia.

When delivering these workshops, I encountered, much to my surprise, something very similar. While initially met with suspicion and some very homophobic remarks, after some gentle nudging, I was surprised and elated at how self-aware these youth were and how much capacity they have for change.

I usually open the workshop by asking them why they thought someone from an AIDS organization would be coming to speak to them about homophobia. Surprisingly, the youth have been very careful not to reproduce the stereotype that HIV was a “gay disease”. In fact, some of them even identified this as a stereotype. While the connection between HIV and homophobia is not always clear, I briefly explain how they might be interconnected. I tell them that twenty to forty percent of homeless youth  are LGBT, one in three transgender youth will be turned away from a shelter due to their gender identity/expression, and that one in two LGBT youth experienced a negative reaction from their parents when they came out (often they were kicked out of their house). Many of the youth seem to be able to relate to this in some way.

“I tell them that Canadian LGBT youth hear anti-gay slurs an average of twenty-six times a day”

Furthermore, I explain, experiencing homophobia can cause LGBT or questioning people to engage in riskier behavior that puts them at increased risk of HIV and other STIs. Additionally, a lack of queer relevant and positive sexual health information can increase LGBT people’s risk of HIV and other STIs.  Next I tell them that Canadian LGBT youth hear anti-gay slurs an average of twenty-six times a day and are five times more likely to experience violence or harassment than their heterosexual peers. Additionally, an estimated 28% of completed suicides are by LGBT people.  The point I am trying to make is not only that there is a connection between HIV and experiencing homophobia, but that homophobia has real, harmful consequences for people who experience it;  a point that was not lost on all the youth.

After this, we talk about why people might be homophobic. This is the part I was most worried about. It usually sparks the most discussion and is where the majority of the homophobic comments come out. The most common being, “I don’t mind gay people, as long as they…keep it to themselves/don’t flaunt it/ don’t hit on me, etc.” Here is where the real challenge lies:  how do you tactfully call a fourteen-year-old a homophobe, or more appropriately, how do you help them recognize their own homophobia? I try to direct conversation to how people may be uncomfortable with homosexuality because they are simply not exposed to it very often, how homophobia is a learned behaviour (“my father told me if a man ever hits on me to punch him in the face”), and how people may have their own internalized stigma. I then ask how they might react if someone of the opposite sex, who they were not interested in, hit on them and ask how that is different from someone of the same sex. It is here that some may begin to see their own homophobia.

“How can we expect them to challenge homophobia when doing so would risk them being labeled as gay and therefore experiencing the same discrimination that LGBT people experience regularly?”

What I really noticed from these workshops was that it was the males that were more openly homophobic. In general, the female youth had an easier time seeing the connections between marginalization, homophobia, oppression and HIV. They were more likely to understand gender norms and how they relate to homophobia. They tended to have an easier time expressing themselves and generally expressed more tolerance of LGBT people. What this suggests is not that girls are generally more tolerant, but that perhaps there is less room in our society for boys to be openly tolerant of people who differ outside of “the norm”, especially with regard to sexual orientation. In a society where boys are taught to be hard, strong, athletic, aggressive, and emotionally closed off, where is there room for anyone who falls outside of this construction? How are boys supposed to talk about things like homophobia, when they, by and large, have not been given the tools to do so? How can we expect them to challenge homophobia when doing so would risk them being labeled as gay and therefore experiencing the same discrimination that LGBT people experience regularly? That takes a particular strength, one that we as a society, often fail to teach our sons.

Despite these challenges, I was pleasantly surprised at the willingness of the youth, both male and female, to engage with these difficult topics and make connections. Near the end of the workshop, when the discussion moved more to ways that we can challenge homophobia, many of them had begun to question their own prejudices. Several youth remarked that they had not thought like this in a long time. Another youth began to question himself on why he was okay with lesbians, but so uncomfortable with gays. At one point, the conversation even turned to feminism.  I could see them struggling with these ideas, engaging in debates with one another, and working through them. The youth wanted to engage with these topics, they wanted to be challenged, many even wanted to see change, which made me question  why are there not more workshops like this?

 These workshops have, by far, been the most rewarding and encouraging part of my position thus far. I was not met with the same skepticism or blank stares I had anticipated. It was the opposite, near the end of the workshop I was having to move on in order to finish on time. When I asked the youth what they would commit to change in their lives, I got a whole myriad of amazing answers. Some stated they would change how they viewed society as a whole; others said they would challenge stereotypes. Some youth committed to not using “that’s so gay”, and others said they would change the way they viewed LGBT people, or even try to get to know an LGBT person as a person, separate from their sexual orientation.

 Like those who took pictures for our graffiti project, I was very pleasantly surprised at the amount of resilience and strength that exists within our community.  Even though the homophobia that exists both overtly and covertly in our society can be overwhelming and discouraging, these youth reaffirmed for me that there is in fact plenty of room for change. We are able to engage with these ideas, to challenge homophobia in our lives, and significantly decrease homophobia in our communities, we may just need to do it one workshop at a time.