I was deeply troubled by the article “Gay Enough” (published April 15) regarding sexuality. One of the subjects of the article, Catherine Kirchhoff, shared grievances focused on herself as “not being gay enough.” I found myself angrily reading the article with the thought “this girl knows nothing about the distinction between sexuality and gender” mounting in the back of my mind. Are we still not able to make the distinction between gender identity and sexuality? Having studied the topic, I have come to understand when we talk about hetero-normative sexuality we talk about hetero-normative gender performances. Knowing this fact made me so frustrated at the link establish between hetero-normative gender and homosexual preferences.
While I found Kirchhoff’s situation troubling, I was little, if at all, concerned with her comfort on this campus. I was not troubled by thoughts of inadequacy regarding her sexuality; sad for her, but I’m not buying her a pint of Ben and Jerry’s. I am more concerned with the individuals who receive a dark permission to doubt themselves because of her. This very inability to identify with the aspects of the homosexual community leads to the number of closeted male homosexuals on this campus. I feel like her whiney “oh-poor-me” attitude is not only an indication of her lack of understanding of identity, but also the load of crap that is dangerous to occur any where but the page of her locked (most likely pink) diary.
Josh Turk ’12
