DEAR STRAIGHT PEOPLE

Dear Straight People

I really do not understand some of you people.

You really don’t have to be an LGBT ally, I swear. You don’t. Please if you aren’t, do not label yourself an ally. I find it personally insulting, like, it pulls all my triggers.

You want to say rubbish, and you know what you want to say is rubbish, so you start the rubbish by calling yourself an LGBT advocate.

Jesus! Nawa o!

And one would think you so-called allies would actually realize your mistake after you’ve been corrected by someone else, maybe even by someone who’s part of the LGBT community.

But no, your village people will not ‘gree. The thing in your brain will just be pushing you, pushing you.

Some days ago, someone made a post about how “Facebook gays” are always in people’s faces with their gayness as if they don’t have any other thing in life.

Um, is it by force to be like you? Why can’t I talk about one thing in my life, and just that? Have you ever actually sat down and written a post asking feminists to please talk about something else in their lives, especially the women? No!

Why?

My guess is that you’re not really stupid enough to see anything wrong in using a social media platform to advocate solely for a particular cause. You just squirm when it’s the gays because it makes you uncomfortable.

Well, sorry for the inconvenience, but I’m kinda trying to live my life.

The woman that posted that thing about “Facebook gays”…  I wanted to tell her how condescending she was, but there were already people there telling her and she was not listening. In one comment, she said she was talking to “Facebook gays” in general, not Nigerian gays. In another, she said that she was primarily concerned about our safety, that was why she made the post, but that “Nigerian gays” are too emotional, drama queens, so angry.  Lol. I guess Facebook gays in Sweden should be worrying for their safety too.

I had already almost forgotten that post, when days later, I just chanced on another such eyesore, from one dude whose name I don’t even recognize. In my mind, I was like, “How are we friends and I don’t even recognize your name?” I actually tried to correct him, to tell him how he was talking straight out of his ass, from the privilege of having every single fucking thing around him being straight and heteronormative. Billboards, TV ads, Close Up packets, literally everything.

I remember the woman’s post saying something like, “What’s your favorite movie that has nothing to do with LGBT?”

The sheer privilege in that stupid line!

Like how do you even start salvaging this kind of idiocy?

Please, dear straight people “that don’t hate LGBT people and are LGBT advocates and even have gay friends and family,” what is your favorite movie that has nothing to do with heterosexuality or any heteronormative ideals? What about favourite TV ads? Wait, how many gay ads have you ever even seen on TV?

So what do you mean by a “favorite movie that has nothing to with LGBT”?

Let’s set that aside and return to your concern about our safety.

Honestly, dear straight people who fancy yourselves LGBT advocates, you need to shut up and listen!

You do not care more about my safety more than ME. Just shut up! You don’t!

If you actually cared as much as you claim, you would form Wives’ associations and Husbands’ Associations, and actually fight to make homophobic countries safer for gay people, from the safety your heterosexual marriages afford you.

But no, you won’t do anything, won’t write about it, won’t even bother saying anything when your colleagues are being homophobic. But you feel the need to shut me up “for my own safety”?

“Hey, stay in the closet!” you say.

“Hey, don’t talk about your sexuality!”

“It’s only for your safety.”

It’s just like that twisted argument that women should not exercise as much freedom of movement or choice, so that they won’t be raped.

“Women, don’t go to concerts or free parties so that you won’t get raped.”

“Women, don’t wear things that arouse men so you won’t get raped.”

“LGBT people, don’t shine so that people will not try to snuff you out.”

Ptueh!

And there I was, trying to explain to the mumu that I know the dangers of being openly gay, more than he ever would, seeing as it’s my fucking life!

Just imagine the arrogance!

I have never met a closeted gay person, and started running my mouth about how he should be this, or that. My life would be much easier if every gay Nigerian was out, but everyone’s life is not mine. They have their own goals, their own families with their own ways of dealing with difference. It might be way more inconvenient for them than it is for me.

Or it might be easier. It might just be that they aren’t ready, or they really aren’t passionate about the cause.

I don’t ask them this. This is Nigeria, and I know it can’t be easy. No matter whom you are or which part of the country you live.

We need visibility, yes. But what I have never done is expect that everyone’s life must be viewed and judged through my personal experiences.

How then is it that you, dear straight person, think it is your place to tell LGBT people how they should live their lives?

We need visibility. Any how we can get it, we need it very much.

And if you’re trying to shut us up, if you are trying to shame us into talking about other banal things that have no impact on the actualization of our human rights, you are enemy number two to the Nigerian LGBT community (right next to the idiots that actually step into parliament and try to make laws with their personal prejudices). Dear straight person who fancies himself our friend, no, you’re not an advocate, not an ally; you’re just a fucking dumb-faced enemy.

My own is just to unfriend when I see you’re not listening and prefer to go on erroneously hurting the cause you claim to be for. We can’t even agree to disagree. I refuse to agree to disagree on how best to live my own life. Unfriend. Block. Move on with my unforgivably gay life. It’s that simple.

Oh, and that gay life… It is filled with such career interests as Queer Immunotherapy and Clinical Immunology; hobbies such as reading (gay) books, watching Drag Race, eating like a gay person, laughing like a gay person, breathing like a gay person (Some will say some of these are not hobbies but my dear, it’s not your hobby please. Face your front.); best movies such as Holding The Man; and crushing on favorite actors such as Russell Tovey.

On a final note, to my Dear Fellow Gay People, to all the “drama queens” and “angry gays” still keeping their heads up and living their truth in this country, whether real life, or on your social media, or in secret WhatsApp groups, or wherever you people hold coven meetings, remember, don’t let the bitches grind you down.

Written by Ani Kayode Somtochukwu