not so drunk... just pensive

is it fair for the leaders of the lgbt movement to expect me to fight with all of my heart for the institution we commonly know as marriage? it is nearly impossible for me to put all of my passion into a fight that i don't even agree with. of course, i agree that lgbt persons deserve all of the same rights as straight people. however, marriage is one of those things that should be changed at the root. this shouldn't be done just for same-sex couples, but for any couple who does not believe in tying their relationship by the will of god. if i were to, one day, find a man who i found to be completely amazing and beautiful and fabulous and was somehow physically, emotionally, and sexually attracted to him, i would still not marry him. i should be able to receive the benefits that he has from his job and he should be able to come see me in the hospital when i am ill. these should not be rights given to me by a religious diety. so how can i possibly give everything to the fight for marraige equality when the root of the problem is so much deeper? there should be partner-benefit equality for all. this should not have to come from god.

i understand that the most influencial thing to fight for in terms of the lgbt community is something that is provided on a federal level. however, the things that matter to me are smaller, closer-to-home things. i want my children to be taught about love, not man+woman+children=family, i want them to feel safe in schools and not be afraid of bullying because they have two mommies. i want hate crimes to be identified differently than other violent crimes in my home state of michigan. and i want to not face discrimination in the workplace. how can i convince the head-honchos of the lgbt movement that these are the issues important to me and that these are the things we should be coming together and fighting for? i can't. so i have to keep going on the track of fighting for marriage with hopes that the eventual results will trickle down to helping me and my family in our struggle for equality.

3 Cherry Cokes, 4 Beers, and Red Wings

yesterday in the car, my friend and i were talking about when we knew that the word 'gay' was descriptive of our sexuality.  we both agreed that from a very young age, we knew that we had feelings toward members of the same sex, but we didn't know what it meant until many years later in situations that had one thing in common:  porn.  

my friend realized that he was gay when he realized that he was only watching man on man porn.  i realized that i was gay when i got aroused by breasts in scrambled porn (channel 95 pre-cable boxes).  

the sociological affects of this are scary.  why is it that children must explore their sexuality and attractionality through the pornography industry?  if only homosexuality weren't taboo in society, we could have learned about our sexual orientations via non-sex-only based media.   a huge societal misconception is that being gay is only about who one has sex with, not about who one is emotionally or physically attracted to.  by learning about our sexOs via porn, we are unable to help that stereotype.  

this brings us to the unusual discussion of MSM who do not identify as gay.  there is a huge community, often forgotten or criticized by the queer community, who have sex with people of the same sex and yet do not identify as gay because they find love and attractionality toward people of a different sex.  this community in itself validates the gay identity by proving that it is about more than just sex.  

i must admit that a lot has changed since i was a child.  there are now quite a few television shows and movies that portray queer people and their love toward people of the same sex.  hopefully, for future generations, this can help to explain that being gay is not just about ones sex life.  if i had seen shows that portrayed women loving other women as a child, i could have realized sooner that the emotions i was feeling had an identity and could have become comfortable with myself much sooner.  however, there are perks to not ignorance.  i thought i was just like anyone else as a child and never had to deal with feelings of exclusion or oppression.  i just assumed that all of the other little girls thought that their female teachers were beautiful and had crushes on lois while she was dating superman.  at the same time, having an explanation and definition for those emotions would have been beneficial to my self-development.

speaking of porn, let us analyze hetero porn for a moment.  why is it that the focus is always on the girl, her boobs, and the faces and noises she makes?  why is porn automatically played toward the audience of straight men?  while i do know more men who get off to straight porn than women, this is quite possibly because of the intended audience of the porn industry.  sadly, i can't complain, because it is this cinematography that made me realize what aroused me.  unfortunately today, the porn i want to watch is very hard to find.  discovering real lesbian porn is like trying to find a palm tree in michigan:  the few things you find are most likely fake.  

at least these days we have the internet and no longer have to rely on scrambled porn on channel 95.  maybe one day society will recognize that not only do gay people have a sexuality, but they also have emotions and attractionality that goes even deeper than their sex lives.

7 Beers and the Boobie Game

so when you hook up with a friend's friend, are you supposed to talk about it with the friend?  a few day's ago i fooled around with my friend sam's roommate.  today sam and i were both at the bar, and we ended up hanging out for a while.  i didn't know if i was supposed to say something to him about it or just pretend like it didn't happen.  this is why the chart ruins me.  being in a city where all of the gays know all of the other gays is not productive.  tonight at the bar, i was with the best friend of someone i'm currently hooking up with, another girl who i've been on-and-off hooking up with for the past few months, and the roommate of a different girl who i hooked up with the other day. at this point, what is one to do?  the friend who i went with also had to deal with a guy he had hooked up with about a year ago... and that guy's serious boyfriend.  how do we branch out from such a connected community so that we don't create drama?

let's talk about the chart.  i like to think of myself as a less attractive but more realistic version of alice from the l-word.  the bad part about that is that i am only about 4 steps of separation from any lesbo in the washtenaw county area.  at some point, hooking up with people who your best friend, ex, or current crush has hooked up with is just wrong!  but there really isn't anyone else, sadly.  at this point its probably necessary to clarify: i'm not a whore.  the queer community is really amazing because of how we all can latch together.  i appreciate it more than anything else in my life.  however, it is also horrible because we can never get away from those who we have hooked up with, whether it be face to face or via friends.  

back to tonight's conversation...or lack there of.  when you gain a link on the chart, who do you tell?? unlike the technologically advance lesbian community of the west coast, we do not have a live-feed chart to look at to see who is hooking up with whom and when.  so even if they do know for some reason, is a conversation supposed to follow?  today, i went with the no.  if the other party wants to bring it up, then that is fine, but what is the point of creating a situation even more awkward than necessary?  so my advice:  sit back and relax.  if someone wants to talk about you and your sexual endeavors, i'm sure they will.  but untill then, stick to old rule of thumb and don't kiss and tell.  

Cherry Popov, Miller Lite, and seven horny dykes

why is it that gay women and gay men are not supposed to be friends?  every time i go out with a group of my gay men friends, i get asked if i am a fag hag (or my new favorite term for it, fruit fly).  we are all a part of one community, arguably, so why can we not be part of one social circle?  

i, of course, get sick of men.  but so many of my best friends are gay men.  we have a lot in common and its much easier to wingman this way.  when two single women go out to the bar or club, wingmanning for each other can get complicated.  however, when i'm out with my boys, there is no complication.  we work together to make sure that neither of us goes home alone, or at least without a little messing around.  

i think that a lot of lesbians are bitter toward men.  not because they want to be men, but because men have the luxury of living in a very male-centric nation.  as lesbians, feminism is also an easy identity to fall into.  and however great feminism is, it really brings to light the things in this country that oppress us.  with this fact in the front of our minds, it is easy to subconsciously be bitter toward men.  we must realize though, that this country that focuses so much on masculinity is also discriminating against gay men.  they take a blunt of the oppression almost as much as we as women do.  lack of masculinity in a man, aka not yelling when the packers score, not getting bored during musicals, and not wearing jeans below the ass, is so unacceptable by today's societal standards that gay men face nearly as much oppression as us lesbian women. 

so maybe this bitterness is all in my head.  maybe there are other reasons for our gender-binary esque separation in gay social circles.  however, i can't imagine my life without my male friends.  i can't imagine going out and not wanting them there.  i would encourage any lesbian to find herself some gay men.  they are a blast.  

as i make this plug to the women, i must also ask something of the men.  when you see a chick who is with gay men and is dressed slightly femme, do not assume she is a fruit fly.  its offensive, rude, and oftentimes very untrue!  thanks =]

3 Martinis and a Snuggle Session

welcome.  

the thoughts and conversations held by people under the influence never cease to surprise me.  and lets be honest, these conversations usually include me.  

martini mondays at cafe felix is my new favorite drunken experience.  half off martinis while sitting along main street watching all the other drunk assholes try to get to their next location makes me a happy gal.  last night, much like every other night, the conversation quickly led to a discussion around what is lesbian sex.  how do they do it?  is there a top and a bottom?  how does one initiate it?  does using a strap-on count as intercourse?  

lets start with the basics.  sex, like most any other word, is strongly based on self-definition.  i could say that sex is only intercourse, while someone else could say sex is any messing around 'down there' and someone else could say that its any type of penetration.  to me, oral is always sex.  its something very intimate and something that i personally won't do to just anyone.  outside of that, it depends upon the intimacy level.  if a girl sticks her hand up my skirt at the bar and slips a finger in, i don't consider that sex.  however, if i'm in a girls bed and after some hot'n'heavy foreplay she sticks em in, that is most likely sex to me.  

moving on to 'how do they do it'.  like i said before, there are many different forms of lesbian 'sex'.  like all other women, there are three different areas to be discussed.  let's start from behind.  anal sex is something that i personally am not into, but i know a lot of women who get great pleasure from it.  however, due to my lack of experience, lets move on to the vagina. penetration can be done with fingers, strap-ons, and some people even say with the tongue.  the best thing about using your hands is that you can do each other simultaneously while still making out or doing whatever you were doing with your mouth.  strap-ons are also much fun, but due to it being... detached.. sometimes the process of using one can be slightly awkward or embarrassing.  but when you are comfortable with your partner, it can be a very rewarding experience.  strap-ons are basically just dildos on a harness.  they come in all shapes and colors, and they even make harnesses to strap onto thighs these days.  forward even more, lets discuss the clit.  clitoral stimulation is the only way over 50% of women can get an orgasm.  this can be done with a vibrator, with fingers, with a tongue, or with the ever-so-famous 'scissoring' method.  which, i just found out yesterday, lesbians actually do.  to me, it is kind of the female version of docking.  it might be enjoyable, but i could never do it without giggling.  maybe we'll come back to this stuff later, but let's continue on with the other questions.  

is there a top and a bottom?  yes, there can be.  this can often be taken very literally to mean who is on top of the other person and who is on the bottom, or it could mean who likes to pleasure and who likes to be pleasured.  some people use this terminology to mean who gives penetration and who takes it, especially in dichotomous butch/femme relationships.  

as far as how to initiate girl on girl sex, it is pretty much the same as any other type of sex.  my trick is, if i see a woman who i want to hook up with, go up to her and mid-conversation begin rubbing the small of her back.  just lightly, keeping the hand still and just moving the fingers right above her pants.  for some reason, this always seems to work.  after that, there is generally kissing, touching, and undressing.  but thats pretty generic, from what i understand. 

lastly, i want to address the issue of intercourse.  does having strap-on penetration count?  if i've had sex with a trans man who used a strap-on, did i lose my gold star?  i'd like to say no, because i LOVE my gold star.  however, that right there is me discriminating.  in the end, though, no sexually transmitted infections can be transmitted from silicone to vagina.  so yes, i have hooked up with men, but i'd like to believe that my gold star is still in tact and that strap-on penetration is not intercourse  (at least via red cross definition).   

so, this was the bulk of last nights conversation at martini mondays.  after a quick stop at a peter pan party, i headed to ypsi for a late night snuggle session while we discussed what it means to have been in love.  but hai, thats a conversation for a whole different post.