🏳️‍🌈QUEER! (But also for the straights)

Body Image for the Queers (& Straights)

All right, Deanna, I’ve spent the last few weeks talking about Bridgerton and the idea of beauty standards for women, and more specifically, how those standards are a tool of the patriarchy.

There are a lot of reasons why we as individuals might NOT want to measure our worth based on whether or not men find us fuckable. For example, we believe:

We do not exist to be eye candy for others.

Our worth isn’t tied to attractiveness.

Our bodies are our tools to move through the world & live our purpose.

WE’RE QUEER AND MAYBE DON’T CARE ABOUT FUCKING MEN.

(Hi, hello, it’s me, I am all of the above.*)
*I’m queer & pansexual.

So, so, SO much of the discussion of Body Image is framed within heteronormative standards–and for good reason:

The patriarchy is built upon the belief that male heteronormativity is the peak of all human existence. So all of our Body Image exists in relation to that.

Most people identify as heterosexual (but that’s changing 😁 ) so that frame does speak to most people’s experience.

BUT that means that we’re majorly lacking in discussion about Body Image outside of the heteronormative context.

So here I am, making a Gay Body Image Festivus for the rest of us!

STRAIGHTS, don’t leave yet!

My definition of queerness is this:

Queer’ not as being about who you’re having sex with (that can be a dimension of it); but ‘queer’ as being about the self that is at odds with everything around it and that has to invent and create and find a place to speak and to thrive and to live. –bell hooks

So, as someone who is divesting from diet & toxic fitness culture, western beauty standards, and generally all forms of oppression, YOU are queer, because that is at odds with everything around you.

Let’s get into it!

Okay, if women are basically taught NOT to have opinions about our own bodies, (read more about that here) and that our default preference for how our bodies exist & are adorned should be determined by men (say hello–and goodbye—to The Male Gaze…)

But then we realize we are not interested in men (or are not exclusively interested in men)…

HOW WE SHOULD LOOK AND WHAT WE SHOULD FIND ATTRACTIVE IN OTHER WOMEN & ENBY FOLKS?!

The answer, of course, is “however & whatever you want.”

But in a world that has not only discouraged us from forming opinions about what we like & want (“good girls get what they get & don’t throw a fit”), but also actively punishes us for voicing such opinions (“she’s such a bitch”), figuring out what you want/like/prefer/feel comfortable with IS A TALL ORDER!

FOR STRAIGHT & GAY FOLKS ALIKE, the question is this:

When are you going to figure out for yourself what you like, want, & deserve?

When are you going to realize you are worthy of having all of that?

When are you going to discover that no one else can do this for you?

You are your own knight in shining armor, your own hero, your own savior.