I’m a very curious somebody. I am basically an adult with the spirit of a toddler that has just been told, “Don’t touch anything”. Don’t believe me? You’re free to ask my current manager.
My curiosity spans across all areas of life, and it recently spawned a great conversation with a close friend of mine who is openly gay. If it were to be recorded and replayed, a huge chunk of that conversation would require beeping (he swears like it’s a full time job); but the part that inspired me is his assertion that the conversations in all media platforms about the Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual, and Transgender (LGBT) community are misconstrued.
My friend believes that the narrative is completely wrong, and that many people haven’t gotten the slightest idea of what they are talking about. I chose to take his word for it; after all, he has been living openly gay for many years so he should know. That is exactly what I want to tackle in this piece - narrative.
To some extent, narratives set the tone of how we view and treat one another. We believe what we are told and shown, while we are also fixated on what we know (or in some cases, what we think we know).
For many years in my childhood, my mother refused to buy me Dickies apparel. She would always argue that Dickies clothing is the choice of clothing for people who smoke a lot of marijuana and are involved in criminal activities. I do not blame her, because that was the general idea in her spectrum. However, Dickies produced some of the coolest clothes but to this day it’s not a brand that’s at the top of my mind when I think of buying clothes. What we are told by the people we hold to the highest regard, is often gospel to us.
I’m sure most of us will see the truth in my friend’s argument. The LGBT community is always painted with one brush, every time without fail. Think about a gay person right now, and I am sure you have either thought of Somizi or someone with a similar personality. Why? Because Somizi has influence and money, and therefore he became the official representative by default. I am not against Somgaga, but as I have learnt, there are different types of gay people and people need to know about them in order to be more tolerant and compassionate.
Not every gay person has a sparkling personality; some are just down to earth guys that can possibly go unnoticed when hanging with the gents. Lesbian people aren’t just ladies with muscles and match sticks on their mouths, walking like boys. Also, as my friend has taught me, gay men are not attracted to every man on the planet.
A while back, a disabled girl who came to my office asked me, “Why do people treat disabled people the way they do? Why do they pity us and think we’re unable to do anything?” After our conversation – yes, I have a lot of conversations, I can’t help but be intrigued by what I don’t know – I understood that what I knew was flawed. Disabled people aren’t helpless; they deserve the same kind of treatment abled people get. They have personalities like we all do, and they each have individual stories to tell.
The narrative is important, and it has to be set right. We cannot be sheep who passively consume life when all it takes is simply asking questions. We have our whole lives to make things right, but we have to start educating ourselves now to be on track.
Narratives about our own lives need to be set right, and luckily you get to do that by yourself. Everyone is more than just the preconceived assumptions, so we all need to take time and learn to be better.
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