lilietsblog:
theunitofcaring:
i.
Back when I thought I was straight I would go on dates with boys. The boys would usually want to kiss me. I disliked kissing, but I thought that their preferences deserved to count as much as mine, and I reasoned that they probably liked kissing more than I disliked kissing. So kissing was a morally good thing to do. I also reasoned that if I told them I disliked the kissing then they’d feel guilty and enjoy it less. So I did not tell them.
I am certain I was making some kind of critical error but it has taken me a long time to figure out what it might be.
ii.
I like cuddling. I know some straight girls who like cuddling with their straight female friends but don’t want to cuddle with people who might be attracted to them because it makes them uncomfortable. But they don’t want to explicitly tell me this preference because they’re worried it’s homophobic. Ever since I learned that this dynamic was present in at least one friendship of mine I have not cuddled with any straight girls because there’s a plausible scenario in which I’d be making them uncomfortable and they wouldn’t tell me.
Keep reading
So this is a very long post and I love it but I know some people don’t read posts this long so I’m going to write out the thing I took away from this which is a very great thing.
Even if your preferences are influenced by ‘societal bias’, you don’t have to violate them.
If something physically intimate is making you uncomfortable, you don’t have to keep doing it even if it’s just because your brain has been indoctrinated.
Your bodily autonomy and right to be comfortable trumps everything, and other people have no right to your body, no matter what their needs.
If you violate/ignore your own boundaries, or feel obligated to do it, it will end up worse, it will end up doing more harm in the end than any accidental microaggression that results from enforcing them.
You should strive to not be an asshole about it.
But keeping your own body to yourself is not being an asshole, not ever.
(via seananmcguire)