My [best] friend and I recently got in a huge fight. She's the second person I came out to (I've been out to friends/fam for a few months now), and she has probably been my main ally. Sorry in advance for the detail and length of this, I'm just really overwhelmed. Her school's prom policy is really homophobic (enough where I took offense), and she is saying that, because it doesn't offend HER as an ally, it's totally okay and acceptable. We ended up getting into it and she doesn't seem to realize her privilege and how closeminded she's being. I started thinking and realizing how ignorant she's being. When I was working on coming out to my family, she threatened to out my dad if I didn't do it myself (she said she'd "be the bad cop" if it meant helping me). I thought it was just what friends did (WRONG). She's ignorant and stubborn about her ex-step sister (who is trans) and her other sister, who is queer. She outed me to her Christian Conservative Homophobic mother without telling me and now uses that as proof that she's a good ally. Whenever she starts to talk about other things like going to Pride this year, she always has to find ways to make it 100000000% clear that she's just an ally because she "doesn't want to get hit on by lesbians" when we're there. But, she's okay with flirting with me. Now, she's taken to apologizing for being straight, and saying she feels discriminated against because she's not queer (and means it seriously - it reminds me of mens' rights activists complaining) Is this homophobic of her, or is this just me being oversensitive? I've tried educating her for months, but I don't think anything I can do or say is going to do anything. Am I right? What should I do? Are there any good resources for allies that I could send her? Is it even worth trying anymore? Our relationship gets in the way of my friendships with people who don't live an hour away. Even in the like five days we haven't been speaking, I'm already finding myself actually getting closer to my school friends who are genuinely, thoroughly, brutally supportive of the entire lgbt community... Is that a sign of something? Eeee, help? :/ ---------- Post added 11th Feb 2014 at 04:11 PM ---------- Oops!! I totally didn't see the friends forum. Is there a way to move this? ^^'
Nope, she's not an ally and is being very insensitive if not downright homophobic. You don't threaten to out your best friend without their permission, that's messed up. You don't have to agree on everything to be friends, but you do have to be a good friend. Sexuality aside, spreading your business around town without your consent is what bad friends do. You could direct her to PFLAG or a similar org/website. Does your school have a GSA? You could try going to meetings together. Either way, I'd talk to her about how you feel, what she did wrong, and why it was out of line(If she told you something like..say she was having sex with a boy and didn't want her parents finding out, and you told/ threatened to tell her mom anyway how would she feel?).
She doesn't sound like an ally IMO. I've also had experiences with people calling themselves "straight allies" but doing/saying really homophobic things and making me feel devalued. I agree that she isn't aware of her privilege. I have nothing against straight people or allies, but acting like things are acceptable because straight people have the rights and gays don't isn't support.
Sounds pretty homophobic to me. A lot of allies like to take to that whole, "I'm straight, should I feel guilty for it?" thing. When they do that they are totally ignoring the issues we face, if not entirely erasing them. Arguing with you over it makes it worse. Outing you without your consent...even less ok. It can be hard to fix that mind set as well. Just be calm and patient with her, pick your battles, don't argue needlessly.
