Political Crossfire Forums

Gryff1nd0r · Joined: 12 Nov 2004 Posts: 2277 Location: Cambridge, MA

Thanks for the posts. I would say that the problem isn't so much that she won't drop it with ME... she dropped it pretty fast and made a quick cover up (which I granted her). The problem is more that she is being incredibly akward and weird, and other people are noticing it more and more. They figure something is wrong with her, and they figure I know. It just puts me in a really weird spot and its frusterating. Like, she tries WAY too hard to make the statement that "I AM ABSOLUTELY NOT GAY," like making ridiculously disgusted faces whenever someone says the word "lesbian". I just want to kick her. I would feel more bad for her if she wasn't so dishonest about things (it isn't just about this, she's like that about a lot of things).

LostSoul3412 · Joined: 11 Feb 2005 Posts: 7657

Gryff1nd0r wrote: Thanks for the posts. I would say that the problem isn't so much that she won't drop it with ME... she dropped it pretty fast and made a quick cover up (which I granted her). The problem is more that she is being incredibly akward and weird, and other people are noticing it more and more. They figure something is wrong with her, and they figure I know. It just puts me in a really weird spot and its frusterating. Like, she tries WAY too hard to make the statement that "I AM ABSOLUTELY NOT GAY," like making ridiculously disgusted faces whenever someone says the word "lesbian". I just want to kick her. I would feel more bad for her if she wasn't so dishonest about things (it isn't just about this, she's like that about a lot of things).

Wait, is this the same friend who was telling everyone she was a lesbian?

Gryff1nd0r · Joined: 12 Nov 2004 Posts: 2277 Location: Cambridge, MA

LostSoul3412 wrote: Gryff1nd0r wrote: Thanks for the posts. I would say that the problem isn't so much that she won't drop it with ME... she dropped it pretty fast and made a quick cover up (which I granted her). The problem is more that she is being incredibly akward and weird, and other people are noticing it more and more. They figure something is wrong with her, and they figure I know. It just puts me in a really weird spot and its frusterating. Like, she tries WAY too hard to make the statement that "I AM ABSOLUTELY NOT GAY," like making ridiculously disgusted faces whenever someone says the word "lesbian". I just want to kick her. I would feel more bad for her if she wasn't so dishonest about things (it isn't just about this, she's like that about a lot of things).

Wait, is this the same friend who was telling everyone she was a lesbian?

no no no.... she didn't tell ANYONE except me. I'm the only one who knows. That's why her gay comments to me were so akward.

agentkgb · Joined: 23 Aug 2006 Posts: 2241 Location: US

Do you live in a conservative area or a liberal one? I mean, there are going to be people who don't accept it either way but it seems like there'd be a difference between some town in a red state and a college in a blue state. My essential question being: is she especially worried people who aren't her friends are going to find out she's a lesbian?

TheGirlNextDoor · Joined: 08 Jul 2004 Posts: 22608

Generalizations F.T.L.

We do have colleges in red states, by the way. I've lived in KANSAS all my life and grew up in the 70's/80's and had many friends who were homosexual. Big deal. You make it sound like we'd stone them or throw them into a lake with concrete shoes. :?

[sarcasm]
We aren't all a bunch of young'uns with no edumukation and 25 childrens ....we'uns all don't live in trailer houses and have missin' toofers.

*spit*[/sarcasm]

:roll:

cap'n queasy · Joined: 15 May 2004 Posts: 34968

Enoch wrote: cap'n queasy wrote: Gryff1nd0r wrote: Just came out to me.

I didn't see it coming.. I'm not a very perseptive person I guess. But she has done SO much stuff with guys, I was pretty much shocked.

She then went on to tell me that she has always been positive that I am gay and then sort of trailed off as if giving me space to say, "Oh, yeah, I'm gay too."

But I didn't, because I'm not. I get the distinct impression that she WANTS me to be, and as thick skulled as I am, if I can see that, then I'm probably right. Its really annoying because she's my best friend and I really would rather her be straight at this point.

See, nobody knows but me, and she doesn't want anyone to know. But when we are in public, she makes comments trying to prove to everyone that she is NOT gay, and she makes ME look like the gay one! For example, I was joking around and saying funny pickup lines (not to anyone in particular, I was just sort of saying them to everyone at the table). She blurts out, "Gryff, you had better not try one of those on me or I'll punch you in the face."........................ aaaaaakward. And of course she just randomly calls me gay all the time, and it pisses me off because I happen to know that SHE'S gay, and she's trusting me to keep it a secret, but at the same time she's constantly hinting to people around us that I'M gay.

I'm stressed out about classes and stuff anyway right now, so I'm just venting. I feel weird about all this. It would be fine if she would just come out to the world, but no, it has to be our little secret, and that's what makes things so weird. When she "jokes" around in public saying that I'm gay, I feel really akward for a couple reasons: one, there are plenty of lesbians on our team, and I'm friends with plenty of them, and it sort of offends me when anyone says "gay" like its a disgrace; two, because she IS gay, but hiding it, I can't comfortably joke back and call her gay because she would probably get upset and act really akward.

Ok I don't even know why I' m posting this here. I gotta go. Comments?

Re-evaluate your friendship.

That's really flaky.

As rare as this is...I agree with Cap'n. (I know, cap'n, your shocked ;-) ).

For someone who, herself, is trusting you to keep her secret this really doesn't seem like an appropriate way for her to act. Talk to her, and if it doesn't improve, you may need to re-evaluate what she means to you as a friend. You don't need to out her, but you don't need to put up with that either.

I'm not shocked at all. I know you are an extremely intelligent individual. Anyone with any "people" experience knows how to deal with this type of person, avoid them like the plague and be brutally honest and to the point if that is what it takes to get their attention. Youngsters usually don't know what to do when they encounter the type of person who gets satisfaction from playing these kind of head games, so I'm sure Gryff will appreciate the fact that you did care enough to provide advice when asked. Otherwise she wouldn't have asked in the first place. It's sound advice.

Some people are like psychic vampires who seem to feed off of seeing how far they can test the bonds of friendship and society, it is best to spot them early and move on. Sometimes it can get a little messy extricating yourself from such a "friendship" if you get too up close and personal, because they know quite well how to take advantage of a good person's kindness for their own melodramatic benefit.

00timh · Joined: 08 Nov 2004 Posts: 12729 Location: upstate NY

TheGirlNextDoor wrote: Generalizations F.T.L.

We do have colleges in red states, by the way. I've lived in KANSAS all my life and grew up in the 70's/80's and had many friends who were homosexual. Big deal. You make it sound like we'd stone them or throw them into a lake with concrete shoes. :?

[sarcasm]
We aren't all a bunch of young'uns with no edumukation and 25 childrens ....we'uns all don't live in trailer houses and have missin' toofers.

*spit*[/sarcasm] :roll:
ding ding ding ding

I live in a small village in a conservative area, with a lot of religious people, and still most of us know people who are gay and accept them for the most part. Many gay people see those who are against them and magnify it to anyone who lives in a rural or conservative area.

You are always going to have people who discriminate against you. The media often likes to portray rural conservatives as the only type of people who dislike gay people. I've lived in one of the largest cities in the world and I now live in a village of less than a thousand. As GND said, we are not all living in trailers inbreeding.... and hating anything that is not a Republican voting white hetoerosexual.

agentkgb · Joined: 23 Aug 2006 Posts: 2241 Location: US

TheGirlNextDoor wrote: We do have colleges in red states, by the way.
I never said you didn't. I just meant that college campuses are usually more liberal than other places and more likely to accept homosexuality.
TheGirlNextDoor wrote: You make it sound like we'd stone them or throw them into a lake with concrete shoes. :?
I said it seemed like there'd be a difference between a town in a mostly conservative state and a college in a mostly liberal state and it sounds like I think you stone gays? :? I certainly didn't mean that.
Edited

toddytodd · Joined: 20 May 2006 Posts: 2736

Gryff1nd0r wrote: Just came out to me.

I didn't see it coming.. I'm not a very perseptive person I guess. But she has done SO much stuff with guys, I was pretty much shocked.

She then went on to tell me that she has always been positive that I am gay and then sort of trailed off as if giving me space to say, "Oh, yeah, I'm gay too."

But I didn't, because I'm not. I get the distinct impression that she WANTS me to be, and as thick skulled as I am, if I can see that, then I'm probably right. Its really annoying because she's my best friend and I really would rather her be straight at this point.

See, nobody knows but me, and she doesn't want anyone to know. But when we are in public, she makes comments trying to prove to everyone that she is NOT gay, and she makes ME look like the gay one! For example, I was joking around and saying funny pickup lines (not to anyone in particular, I was just sort of saying them to everyone at the table). She blurts out, "Gryff, you had better not try one of those on me or I'll punch you in the face."........................ aaaaaakward. And of course she just randomly calls me gay all the time, and it pisses me off because I happen to know that SHE'S gay, and she's trusting me to keep it a secret, but at the same time she's constantly hinting to people around us that I'M gay.

I'm stressed out about classes and stuff anyway right now, so I'm just venting. I feel weird about all this. It would be fine if she would just come out to the world, but no, it has to be our little secret, and that's what makes things so weird. When she "jokes" around in public saying that I'm gay, I feel really akward for a couple reasons: one, there are plenty of lesbians on our team, and I'm friends with plenty of them, and it sort of offends me when anyone says "gay" like its a disgrace; two, because she IS gay, but hiding it, I can't comfortably joke back and call her gay because she would probably get upset and act really akward.

Ok I don't even know why I' m posting this here. I gotta go. Comments?

I would say that obviously this person isn't comfortable with themselves yet. I don't see this person as being a flate, fake, weird, (etc) only immature - perhaps even self conscious.
If it were me, the next time this person put me on the spot in public, I would make a sarcastic comment back to her publicly that isn't 'outing', but is intended well enough for them to get the point that you don't like it. Then later, tell them that you won't tolerate being belittled/insulted/made the butt of jokes (whatever) in public by them any longer.
If this doesn't work, you might want to either ignore the comments and/or start to distance yourself from them to a point where you are no longer around them as much, or, to a point when they ask "Hey, what's up with you?".
Sometimes, for some people, this is what it takes.

LostSoul3412 · Joined: 11 Feb 2005 Posts: 7657

Gryff1nd0r wrote: LostSoul3412 wrote: Gryff1nd0r wrote: Thanks for the posts. I would say that the problem isn't so much that she won't drop it with ME... she dropped it pretty fast and made a quick cover up (which I granted her). The problem is more that she is being incredibly akward and weird, and other people are noticing it more and more. They figure something is wrong with her, and they figure I know. It just puts me in a really weird spot and its frusterating. Like, she tries WAY too hard to make the statement that "I AM ABSOLUTELY NOT GAY," like making ridiculously disgusted faces whenever someone says the word "lesbian". I just want to kick her. I would feel more bad for her if she wasn't so dishonest about things (it isn't just about this, she's like that about a lot of things).

Wait, is this the same friend who was telling everyone she was a lesbian?

no no no.... she didn't tell ANYONE except me. I'm the only one who knows. That's why her gay comments to me were so akward.

So you know she's a lesbian, but with everyone else she puts up a barrier to her homosexuality?...

...

:?

Too.... much.... drama....

Gryff1nd0r · Joined: 12 Nov 2004 Posts: 2277 Location: Cambridge, MA

agentkgb wrote: Do you live in a conservative area or a liberal one? I mean, there are going to be people who don't accept it either way but it seems like there'd be a difference between some town in a red state and a college in a blue state. My essential question being: is she especially worried people who aren't her friends are going to find out she's a lesbian?

I'm in a pretty liberal area and we know each other from a hockey team, and lesbians are well accepted. I think the person who has the biggest problem with being gay is her, not other people.

LostSoul3412 wrote: So you know she's a lesbian, but with everyone else she puts up a barrier to her homosexuality?...

...

Too.... much.... drama....

Its because she's in love with me, I've figured that out. Drama? Oh yes.

I feel really bad but I feel nauseated when I see her.

Everyone else, thanks for useful comments. I really don't know how to handle this, I've never been the best people-person and I suck at drama. I hate it actually, I never know what to do.

My other friends know what is going on because I told them, because I couldn't handle it. Maybe that was wrong of me, but I was staying up with her until 4 in the morning on many a school night having serious heart-to-heart talks, thinking we were getting somewhere, and in the end we got nowhere. I tried really hard but I couldn't deal with it, and she's so dishonest with everyone (excluding me) that I felt like it was probably better for her. I told her she needed to tell our other friends (who actually figured it out on their own, and it was already confirmed by me), so she did, but it was ridiculous... she was fake laughing the whole time and they didn't know how the hell they were supposed to respond... was she joking?

My other friends think that things are bad in other ways... I never really thought of how this crap affected me because I was always preoccupied with all her problems, but they have noticed that A) she is obsessed with me, and B) she always compares herself to me in life and she gets really bitter behind my back when I do better than her in sports and school. Its a really weird relationship, and I feel like I have to be there for her because she worries me and I'm the only one she talks to, but at the same time she makes me miserable. But if something happened to her (she gets REALLY down and has other issues) it would be my fault.

she actually told one of my friends before school started that she was going to get me drunk to find out if I was gay... instead she got drunk, told me she was gay, and tried to hook up with me which was probably the most grossest moment of my life.... I am not homophobic in the least, its actually just HER... she grosses me out.

Of course we pretend that didn't happen. I think she thinks I was too drunk to remember, but in reality I was sober enough to realize that I was drunker than her.

LostSoul3412 · Joined: 11 Feb 2005 Posts: 7657

Here's something that you need to ask yourself:

As a friend, is she worth it?

Enoch · Joined: 29 Aug 2005 Posts: 8567

cap'n queasy wrote:
I'm not shocked at all. I know you are an extremely intelligent individual. Anyone with any "people" experience knows how to deal with this type of person, avoid them like the plague and be brutally honest and to the point if that is what it takes to get their attention. Youngsters usually don't know what to do when they encounter the type of person who gets satisfaction from playing these kind of head games, so I'm sure Gryff will appreciate the fact that you did care enough to provide advice when asked. Otherwise she wouldn't have asked in the first place. It's sound advice.

Some people are like psychic vampires who seem to feed off of seeing how far they can test the bonds of friendship and society, it is best to spot them early and move on. Sometimes it can get a little messy extricating yourself from such a "friendship" if you get too up close and personal, because they know quite well how to take advantage of a good person's kindness for their own melodramatic benefit.

Thank you Cap'n. :-) Very kind of you.

I agree with your assesment on the confrontation. Taking this friend aside, telling her exactly what you are feeling (in no uncertain terms) may cause some momentary conflict, but will be helpful in the long run. And if this person is as cap'n described, and is the kind to take advantage of your kindness, then it may be best to cut ties.

Enoch · Joined: 29 Aug 2005 Posts: 8567

TheGirlNextDoor wrote: Generalizations F.T.L.

We do have colleges in red states, by the way. I've lived in KANSAS all my life and grew up in the 70's/80's and had many friends who were homosexual. Big deal. You make it sound like we'd stone them or throw them into a lake with concrete shoes. :?

[sarcasm]
We aren't all a bunch of young'uns with no edumukation and 25 childrens ....we'uns all don't live in trailer houses and have missin' toofers.

*spit*[/sarcasm]

:roll:

As a fellow Red-State citizen, thank you. :-)

I live in Indiana, which is rather conservative overall, and I love it here. I have never had problems with people over being gay (except, ironically, on a liberal college campus....go figure). ;-)

ToonArmyIsComing · Joined: 15 Feb 2005 Posts: 5888 Location: Ontario

00timh wrote: I live in a small village in a conservative area, with a lot of religious people, and still most of us know people who are gay and accept them for the most part. Many gay people see those who are against them and magnify it to anyone who lives in a rural or conservative area.

You are always going to have people who discriminate against you. The media often likes to portray rural conservatives as the only type of people who dislike gay people. I've lived in one of the largest cities in the world and I now live in a village of less than a thousand. As GND said, we are not all living in trailers inbreeding.... and hating anything that is not a Republican voting white hetoerosexual.

There is a huge rural/urban divide and I think even with the rosy picture of the "loving" rural communities that you are painting, in terms of political outlook, the urban people and the rural people are more divided than ever.

Having said that, however, most of the Southern US is fundamentally different to other parts of the Western world and they share very little in common with other Western people. Then again, some Americans put that put that down to American "exceptionalism".