Four months after the Supreme Court legalized same sex marriage, the world celebrates LGBT History Month. During this month, people remember and pay tribute to the former and current advocates of the LGBT community, such as Carol Speser, organizer of the first outdoor pride celebration and Ellen Degeneres, the first openly lesbian actress to play an openly lesbian character on television.
During the month of October, the LGBT community not only acknowledges the commitment and sacrifices of LGBT activists, but it also serves to acknowledge how far acceptance has come in society. However, in order to effectively promote and appreciate gender and sexual equality, it’s important for society to understand what these abbreviations of “LGBT” actually mean.
“One of the biggest misconceptions about the LGBT community is that one has to be gay or straight [to be a part of this community],” said Atticus Ranck, director of transgender services for SunServe. “Sexuality actually lies along a continuum.”
He explained that many people are not 100 percent gay or 100 percent straight. Instead, many people have a fluid sexuality or at least experiences with many different sexes and genders. People often think that the LGBT community only consists of the most commonly heard acronyms, but there is much more to it than that.
“The whole spectrum is LGBTQQIAAP. This stands for lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender, queer, questioning, intersex, asexual, ally and pansexual,” Ranck said.
The biggest dilemma with the LGBT+ acronym is that people do not understand the purpose and importance of these different identifying terms, and, in some cases, those outside of the community use them to separate LGBT members from the rest of the population. These terms are not meant to be demeaning, but instead provide people who identify with these titles, a sense of comfortability.
“The term LGBT is often used as if the members of this community are synonymous,” said Laurie Simontacchi, graduate assistant of the College of Psychology and president of the Gay Straight Alliance, now known as Pride Alliance.
“I try to say LGBT communities, with an emphasis on the plural, because, contrary to popular belief, this acronym does not represent one single group,” Simontacchi said.
Society has created terms with negative connotation to identify people with differing gender or sexuality identification. These terms were used to bash and demean the LGBT community, but just as urban cultures have reclaimed words such as “phat” (pretty, hot and thick) to have progressive meanings, the acronym LGBT serves to reclaim these terms for positivity.
For example, at one point, society made those who identify as being gay afraid of the term itself, and queer was used negatively by people who did not accept lesbian or gay individuals. Today, members of the LGBT+ community proudly embrace these terms as positive recognition and identification.
The first step in acceptance is understanding. People are different in so many ways. With that said, the first step to personal acceptance is a willingness to accept others. As we celebrate this year’s LGBT+ History Month, remember to acknowledge each member of the LGBT+ community as an individual, each deserving of their own right to equality and acceptance.
“Understanding sexual orientation and gender as binary, limits us from truly understanding and appreciating others,” Simontacchi said. “It is because of this that we need to seek information and ask important questions. When we begin to do that, we spread awareness and, in turn, decrease stigma and negative stereotypes.”
For more information on LGBT+ Awareness visit http://lgbthistorymonth.com/.
Facts:
Lesbian- “Female- identified individuals who are primarily attracted romantically to other women-identified people,” Ranck said.
Gay- “Male-identified people who are primarily attracted romantically to other male-identified people,” Ranck said.
Bi-sexual- “Someone of any gender identity or expression who is romantically attracted to both male-identified and female-identified individuals,” Ranck said.
Transgender- “The individual’s gender identity [on the masculine/feminine spectrum] does not match up with their natal sex [the sex assigned at birth],” Simontacchi said. “It is important to recognize that gender identity is not the same thing as sexual orientation.”
Questioning – “Relates to those who are questioning of their gender identity and/or sexual orientation,” Simontacchi said.
Queer – “Queer used to be a very derogatory term used to insult those who aren’t straight or who were at least perceived to be gay,” Ranck said. “It’s personal to each person, and it just means that they don’t abide by traditional definitions of male, female, feminine, masculine, straight, etc.”
Intersex – “A term that means someone is born with ambiguous genitalia, or he or she is born believing they are one sex, but when he or she hits puberty, his or her body starts reacting in an abnormal way,” Ranck said. “The term used to be hermaphrodite, but we don’t use that term anymore.”
Asexual- “Signifies those who are sexually attracted to neither males nor females,” Simontacchi said.
Ally- “Allies support and participate in LGBT awareness,” said Ranck said.
Pansexual – Someone of any gender identity or expression who is romantically attracted to any and all genders; pansexual individuals can be attracted to trans men, trans women, agender, genderqueer, bigender, males, females, etc. The list is endless,” Ranck said.
