Rage and Disgust

I have found my way back to Blogger in a somewhat round-about fashion. I should really be studying for my Microbiology test tomorrow, or the Organic Chemistry test the day after, but the bitter taste in my mouth and angry pounding of my pulse at my throat will not let me be.

Long story short- I stumbled across a blog post called the Tisinai Formula by a so-called "hetero-seperatist." In it, the author asserts that the population of homosexual men is comprised of more pedophiles than heterosexual men, and is thus more likely to molest children.

Words cannot express my rage, my disgust, my need to lash out at this bigoted lie. I will not deny that I am biased in this matter- human beings are creatures of emotion and experience, and to remove these things from our perception of the world is quite impossible.

I know plenty of gay men. Some are silly, some are slightly grumpy, some of them are so flamboyant that you can see the leaping flames from miles away. (Get it? Flaming? Ha, I kill myself.) Some of these men are drama queens, some of them are so quiet that you have to really pry to find out whether something is the matter. None of them are so cruel as to intentionally destroy childhood for their own pleasure- sexual, emotional, or otherwise.

I have met straight men who ARE that cruel.
I dated a man who refused to leave me alone even after he left me for another girl. As we sat in court so that he could contest my attempt at a restraining order he railed to the judge that I "needed to get off my high horse." I just wanted to be left alone, to move on, to date someone else.
I also knew a man whose name was Steve. His wife was my mother's friend, his two children played with us, and he had watched my brothers and myself after school once or twice. Steve was an avid video game player, and I remember him literally whipping through level upon level of Castlevania while I watched in awe...

Steve came to our house one day when I was alone. He asked to be let in so that he could wait for my father to return. I was eleven; of course I said yes. I don't remember exactly how it began, but we started flirting. Much like children on the playground we would tug each other's hair or land a (less than) gentle slap, and then run away giggling. At some point Steve removed the chewing gum from his mouth, deliberately tugged on the collar of my shirt, and dropped the gum into my training bra. I remember thinking that something was wrong, but I didn't know what to do about it. Steve reached into my bra to fish the gum out. I can still remember the carpet that I was staring at, but I cannot- for the life of me- picture his face.

I was lucky in that Steve only came for me a few times, and that the human brain is a marvel of self-preservation. Those memories were locked away quicker than I will ever know for certain. I remember sitting at presentations and nodding fervently while adults explained what to do if someone touched us inappropriately. I was still in fifth or sixth grade for those presentations, which means it took less than a year for my psyche to patch its own gaping wounds. Those wounds reopened when I was in my first year of college, hundreds of miles away from my family. In the seven years that passed, my subconscious guilt for letting Steve into the house, and for submitting to him as meekly as I did, had eaten away at my life. I blamed myself for things that were not my fault. I had no self-esteem, and needed constant reinforcement from other people to derive any self-worth. I first tried to kill myself when I was sixteen, and would try again when I was twenty-one. I didn't yet remember what Steve had done to me on a conscious level, but the experience was still poison in my veins that I could not expel by myself.

I am fifteen years removed from that gullible eleven year-old. I am ten years away from my first suicide attempt, and five years past my second. I am married to a sweet, wonderful man who wraps me in his arms when I sit up in the middle of the night screaming. I have so many friends who empathize with me, and who love me when I am at my worst. My major is molecular biology, my minor is in dance. I play flute and piano and my vocal range is soprano, though I am in desperate need of practice with all of these. I play video games with Brian, I own two rescued dogs, I am still a less-than-stellar cook, and I still enjoy manga and anime. I am still learning what it is to not let a traumatic experience define what happens after. It took years of therapy to admit that I am not to blame for what Steve chose to do. Nor is my mother, who had heard rumors about him and ordered him to stay away from her children. My step-father isn't to blame for not being home, and my brothers bear no responsibility either. The blame is Steve's, and his alone. There is something inherently broken in a person who decides to inflict that kind of harm on another human being- male or female, adult or child, gay or straight.

So, back to the beginning of this post- being homosexual does not make a person monstrous. The choice to molest a child is a conscious one, and those who make it are something less than human. How do I convey this difference to the people whose words and comparisons bother me so? How do I explain that my gay friends are gentle and kind and supportive? How do I show that they are the polar opposite of child molesters?

The answer that I am afraid to acknowledge, and the one that leaves a bitter taste in my mouth, is that I can't. I suppose this is another instance where the blame lies solely with another party, and that I am powerless to influence their choice. I cannot change the choice that another person has made, but I CAN make my own choice. I can choose to try to be a good person, despite all the frustration and despair that I encounter in this world. I can try to embody the traits that I want others to practice. I can love my husband and my friends, care for my family, work to succeed in school, and remember the painful lessons I've been forced to learn. I think this is what a lot of choices have boiled down to.

In closing, Mr. Heteroseparatist- I hope that you read this. I hope that my words strike a chord for you, and that you come to understand why I find your words hurtful and inaccurate. But, if you don't come to see things from my point of view, if you don't change your mind, then that is not my fault, and it does not make me less adequate.