Authors: James Dawson
This Book is Gay
CONTENTS
A guide to recognising your gay saints
This book is dedicated to anyone who has ever wondered.
This Book Is Gay
is a collection of facts, my ideas and my stories but also the testimonies of more than three hundred amazing LGBT* people who shared their stories. In July 2013, I conducted an international survey from which many of the quotes are taken, and also carried out more in-depth interviews with some selected participants.
As not all of the participants are âout' or open about their sexuality, or may have sensitive careers, some names have been changed.
Throughout
This Book Is Gay
, I've used LGBT* to represent the full and infinite spectrum of sexual and gender identities. It's certainly not my intention for anyone to feel excluded by that initialism; I just needed a shorthand or the book would have been a LOT longer!
A huge thank you to everyone who took part. I'm so proud of what we've achieved with this book.
James Dawson
WELCOME TO THE MEMBERS CLUB
- Sometimes men fancy men.
- Sometimes women fancy women.
- Sometimes women fancy men and women.
- Sometimes men fancy women and men.
- Sometimes people don't fancy anyone.
- Sometimes a man might want to be a woman.
- Sometimes a woman might want to be a man.
Got that? It really is that simple.
I could end the lesson, there, but I don't think a few pages would make a very good book, so I
suppose
I should go into a bit more depth â¦
There's a long-running joke that, on âcoming out', a young lesbian, gay guy, bisexual or trans person should receive a membership card and instruction manual.
You're welcome. But this is a manual for everyone â no matter your gender or sexual preference.
School probably hasn't taught you very much about what it's like to be lesbian, gay, bisexual, trans or questioning. You might have heard about famous gay people or seen same-sex couples on TV. You almost certainly know an LGBT* person, even if you aren't aware of it. Like an âalien invasion', we are already amongst you. We serve you in the post office; we teach you maths; we fry your fish and chips.
So why don't we teach you about same-sex couples when we teach sex ed? Or that a lot of people choose their gender? Well, I was a PSHCE (Personal, Social, Health and Citizenship) teacher for a long time, and I always taught my students about these things, but not all schools do, and not all teachers know how â there's NO training for this, I'm afraid.
I surveyed a group of more than three hundred young people in 2012, and ninety-five per cent of them said their school taught them NOTHING about gay sex as a part of sex education. Sex between men and women was routinely presented as âthe norm'.
This lack of education means that loads of young people â gay, straight or bi; trans or cis â have oodles of questions about what it's like to be LGBT*. This book has some of the answers. Whether you think you might be LGBT* or you think you're straight but have questions or you're anywhere in between, this book is for you.
Your sexuality or gender is very much an individual thing, but what if there were a whole bunch of people who'd been through it all before to mentor you through this funny old patch?
The awareness that your sexual or gender identity isn't quite the NORM can be a confusing, exciting, exhilarating, concerning and, frankly, baffling time. Long before you âcome out' and tell people about your identity, it's just you and your brain trying to figure it out, so it can also be a lonely time, often accompanied by whiny music and too much eyeliner.
My experience as a gay white man is not representative of every gay man, let alone the thousands of gay women, bisexual men and women, and trans people who may be reading this book. Therefore, before writing this book, I searched far and wide for dozens of other LGBT* people to share their experiences with you. Individually, we can never know it all, but together we're quite wise, like that baboon in
The Lion King
.
I haven't edited or changed the testimonies of the LGBT* people in this book, so you might not identify with, or agree with, everything they have to say, AND THAT'S FINE. We have to be able to talk about sexuality and identity in a non-hysterical way. Sexuality and gender are individual experiences; people are entitled to opinions and, vitally, we need to be able to make mistakes. I understand identity is an issue that some people feel very strongly about. This is also a good thing â activism is what got us this far â but if people aren't allowed to say what's really on their mind for fear of upsetting people, we'll end up never saying anything at all.
In short, we have to be able to laugh at ourselves, whatever our identity, or we're in for a long-haul life. So, yeah,
This Book Is Gay
isn't entirely serious all the way through (although we do deal with some MEGA-SADFACE topics).
This is something different to the loads of dreary textbooks about gender and sexuality politics that are already out there. This book is serious, but it's also fun and funny.
The whole point of coming out is that we have the FREEDOM to be who we are. When did that stop being FUN?
If you're new to the club, you're lucky because being L or G or B or T or * is SUPER FUN. You're FREE now and don't have to HIDE.
Whatever you identify as by the end of this book, you'll see that, far from being alone, you're joining a vast collective of cool, happy, inspirational people, each with a story to tell.
It's the hippest members' club in town, and you get straight past the velvet rope and into the VIP lounge.
You're not isolated; you're part of something bigger now. Something great.
Let's start at the very beginning (a very good place to start). I guess you're reading this book for one of several reasons. It may be because you already identify as LGBT* (and, let's face it, we love nothing more than talking about it). Maybe you're nosy to see what we get up to between the sheets. It could be you are making fun of it because it has the word âgay' in the title (shame on you). But maybe, just maybe, you picked up this book because you're WONDERING.
It all starts with wondering.
Wondering what it might be like to kiss that boy, or what that girl's breasts look like. What life would be like if you were a girl, not a guy. It's all about wondering.
One day I was in the park sunbathing. On the next picnic blanket over, a mother was talking to her infant son about the things he could do when he was older. The conversation went something like this:
Boy:
Drive a car!
Mum:
Yes!
Boy:
Go to work like Daddy!
Mum:
Yes!
Boy:
Kissing!
Mum:
Yes! Girls ⦠you'll kiss girls.
After I had snatched the child away and left him with social services (OK, I didn't do that, but I probably should have done something other than tut really loudly), I was sad at how we still DEFAULT to heterosexual in the twenty-first century.