A conversation I had yesterday about my daughter....
"I don't agree with her lifestyle. Of course I love her, that goes without saying. But if she asks me if I agree with her choice of lifestyle I won't feel right lying to her. I'll have to tell her that I don't."
"So you think it's a lifestyle?"
"I think it's a choice, yes."
"I see." Long pause. "So.....okay. A choice. So you could choose to love women?"
"Well......no."
"Then why do you think she can choose to love men?"
---
This exchange has probably bothered me more than it should.
On the one hand, I know my daughter is secure enough about who she is to spend precious little time worrying about what other people feel about her sexual orientation. As a friend of mine said, she is intelligent enough to know that not everyone will embrace who she is, or understand, or even wish to bother to make the attempt. She knows some might try to strike out at her with verbal or even physical abuse. She knows this but follows her own path anyway. It's something I admire about her, to be so self-actuated at her age.
On the other hand, I couldn't help but feel a mixture of frustration, exasperation, indignation, impatience, contempt and superiority sweep over me at the words. My daughter isn't a freak and I resented the implication. I could see not being able to accept someone's choice of action or behavior, but being unwilling to accept my daughter for being lesbian is like being unable to accept me because I'm not. Hating on people because of the way that they're born is singularly stupid.
I realize that's applicable only if you believe that orientation is something you're born with. But....how can you not believe it? Setting aside the people who do choose to have relationships with one sex, the other sex, or both sexes (because there are those who make a choice to do so) there are a great many more who were simply born that way. I was born heterosexual. I didn't wonder or question my basic orientation. I experimented, sure....many do. But anyone who was born hetero should be able to acknowledge that they didn't make that choice; nature made it for them a long time before they had any concept of choice or belief. They simply embrace the reality of what they are and society embraces it along with them. I wonder what they'd do if society suddenly decided something else was "normal?"
I knew what my daughter was before she did. She was a little girl, and I knew it. I couldn't articulate it then, it was an amorphous knowing, but it was instinctive and it was correct. She didn't "choose" to like girls when she was 6 or 7 years old. She simply behaved according to her biology, as the rest of us do. I saw and experienced this awakening in her and there's no way anyone will ever convince me it isn't a natural phenomenon. To many, many people, it's not something they can grow out of. It's not a choice. It's who they are.
Yet I know that not everyone has the benefit of my experience to guide them as they're building their belief system. Attitudes are changing now, thank goodness, but there are still many people for whom any other option but Tab A into Slot B "just ain't right." I'll concede that it's much easier to do when you've been on the inside instead of the outside looking in. And I guess I'm being too hard on people -- you can only expect a certain amount of give in each of the people that you know, according to their capabilities. I know the urge to protect my daughter and defend her from judgment is what spurs my desire to obtain their acceptance as well as their tolerance. I know from experience, though, that many people can't give what they haven't got. I hate being a hypocrite, so I shouldn't expect from others what I can't do myself.
Still, she's my girl. My Mama Lion instincts are strong ones.
((Song: "Changes" by David Bowie. Lyrics here:
http://www.teenagewildlife.com/Albums/HD/C.html))
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