#comp het

[justgivemeabookplease]

Shrek 2, while a cinematic masterpiece, is also an interesting look at queerness and comp het.

Fiona is married so it's time to reunite with her parents. But instead of marrying a prince, she's married to an ogre. Not just that, but she's also an ogre. (Yes everyone knew she would sometimes be an ogre but that was when she was a child, she didn't know she would be an ogre for the rest of her life, and besides once she met the right prince she would stop being an ogre. She was supposed to stop being an ogre.)

But okay they're both ogres. We can still ask about when they'll have children because even if they're ogres they can still have kids, right? That's what married princes and princesses do so naturally that's what everyone does. Even if ogres might not be great parents (I've heard that ogres eat their young, is that something you people do?) it's still something that should be discussed.

And okay you can stay in Fiona's childhood bedroom filled with all the reminders that hey, everyone thought she was just a princess and princesses marry princes. Her toys left out from the last time she played with them. The prince slays the ogre. The princess offers a token of gratitude for slaying the ogre. Fiona wrote Mrs. Fiona Charming a million times in her diary because what else was she supposed to grow up to be?

And Harold, the Fairy Godmother says, you have to fix this, your kingdom can't be ruled by ogres. You were unfit to rule, to be loved, when you were a frog but I changed you, I made you better, I made you a prince. You know how this works. Think of your daughter's safety.

Shrek goes to the Fairy Godmother and oh honey, ogres don't live happily ever after. It's just not done. It hasn't happened in all of fairy tale history. You have to change the both of you to be happy. You have to present as a prince and a princess. It will be better. You'll fit in better that way. You'll be accepted that way.

[popstrologypod]

and one more thing, this was 100% a coming out post (ON LESBIAN VISIBILITY DAY AFTER A 13 DAY COUNTDOWN OF RAINBOW PICTURES) and the fact that people chose to ignore that makes me so sad for taylor

[shebecamethesun]

state of grace part 25

(part 24 here | part 26 here)

[biggayenergypod]

Imogen’s quiet “I’ve never liked a boy” carries the weight of years spent trying to fit. Her comp het monologue is one of the most powerful scenes this season. Not loud, not flashy, just honest.

Check out our full episode breakdown of Heartstopper S3 E8!

Watch: https://youtu.be/RdIeKlptQfw

Listen: https://podcasters.spotify.com/pod/show/bgepod

[i-heart-wicked]

So if yall dont know Ariana Grande had recently alluded to a new song for Glinda in For Good

I truly hope it has ✨gay✨ undertones because I feel that was taken away from the change from book to movie

Due to that making of the love triangle much of the queer undertones of Galinda and Elphaba were taken away. though she talks about boys in her POV she never falls for Fiyero its a “i will never get close enough and tell ppl id admire from afar” comp het experience id you know what I mean not to mention the love triangle is more so a plot device to push glinda out of the FULL escape plan which I do kinda hate

Glindas comp het experience is similar to my own so I could be bias

but yeah if they are adding things from the books to the movie then let this be one of them

[aceing-on-the-cake]

Compulsory Heterosexuality Info Dump

So because a friend of mine didn't know what comp het was and their internet history is monitored by their parents so they can't just use google, I'm doing a very quick research dive and giving you guys the results in case there are others out there who are in the same situation. I'll also be tagging blogs bigger than me because again, there might be fellow queers out their who are in the same boat as my friend and I want them to have access to this information.

So what is compulsory heterosexuality (or comp het)?

Comp het is in essence the societal belief and enforcement of being straight.

What does this mean?

In basic form it means that the only options presented to everyone, from the moment of birth, is that of a cis, amatonormative, heterosexual lifestyle.

You are given two gender options, these gender options determine the two roles you're allowed to fulfill, husband and wife, and you are told that these two roles are what will make you happy and are what you are supposed to strive for.

Meaning society, if you are born AFAB, tells you you're going to one day get married, it's going to be a boy, and this is what will make you happy. Almost everything in life is then seen through this lens. How attractive your are, how you are supposed to talk, how you're supposed to behave, etc is all considered through the lens of if a man will be attracted to you.

On the flip side, if you are born AMAB society tells you there are roles you have to fulfill as well. You are told you will one day want a wife, that you have to be able to have a job to provide for her, that you have to behave in a certain emotional way to be strong for her, that if the things you like are too feminine well then you're gay or a girl which is a problem because at the end of the day you're supposed to want the girl-fiance-wife.

This literally just sounds like the patriarchy.

Yes, it does, because it's caused by it. Nowadays people commonly know about compulsory heterosexuality from the Lesbian Masterdoc, but the term actually originated by Adrienne Rich in 1980.

Adrienne Rich in her article Compulsory Heterosexuality and Lesbian Existence put forward three ideas, 1) that heterosexuality and lesbianism were institutions themselves/possible political ideologies, 2) that heterosexuality as a system if not constantly maintained and upheld would eventually crumble and 3) that heterosexuality as a system could be opted out of and actively fought against whether or not you were actually attracted to women/non-women.

This is very different from the way we currently think of and define those terms, I am aware of that, but her point does still stand to some degrees that comp het, cisnormativity and amatonormativity all crumble when we stop rigidly enforcing the structures that uphold them, i.e., the patriarchy, misogyny, classism, and racism.

Ok but like what does that actually look like?

It can look like a lot of things, for a lot of different people. In the Lesbian Masterdoc you see comp het presented from a straightforward lesbian lens (of a 19 year old figuring out and defining their own sexuality guys, I'm not gonna sit here and critique it and rip it to death, go do that somewhere else).

This is therefore presented through things like women/non-women who were raised/socialized as women possibly having crushes on men, but they're always unattainable in some way (celebrities, fictional, someone real but they wouldn't actually ever be able to truly be in a relationship with, etc). It might also show up for lesbians as liking the idea of a man but being uncomfortable when one actually wants to move forward in the process. Or even sometimes it might show up as sexual fantasies with men but they're faceless, they're more an idea, or you're actually viewing another woman sleeping with him.

This presentation of comp het has made a lot of bi/pan/mspec people uncomfortable because they feel they too have experiencing comp het and when reading the Lesbian Masterdoc it's presented as if experiencing this is a straight shot towards being a lesbian.

And they're right that comp het isn't experienced by just lesbians. For mspecs who present feminine/as women this could be in the feeling that they have to dress a certain way to be presentable, but presentable is based on appealing to men. This can mean something as simple as women are expected to wear makeup, always, regardless of if they're looking to seek men's attention or not, because that's the base standard.

For mspecs who present masculine this can look like the inability to express themselves in an overly emotional manner because that doesn't make them "strong" and if they're not "strong" then they won't attract women, and that's what they're supposed to be doing.

For mspecs in general that can look like their queer looking relationships to be seen as a phase even if their mspec-ness is respected because of course they're eventually going to get married to a man/woman.

This can affect polyamorous cishet people in that they're seen as doing heterosexuality wrong because you're supposed to have the one partner and the 2.5 kids.

This can affect aspecs because they're told they'll never truly feel fulfilled if they don't have that boyfriend/girlfriend/partner to love them in a way that's so special nothing else could match up.

This affects all of us guys is my point.

How is this helpful to me?

Well for sapphics and lesbians (or sapphics/mspecs confused on if they are actually lesbians) this can be a helpful concept to consider because it can help you determine what relationships you truly want to pursue, which is the main point I feel is to be gained from the Lesbian Masterdoc. As she's put it "it's way more important to ask yourself if you can be truthfully happy with a man than if you’re attracted to them"

So if you're a sapphic who experiences attraction to men but you honestly can't ever see yourself willingly entering into a relationship with them, consider the idea of comp het.

If you're Achillean the opposite of this can be true, if you've been attracted to women before but honestly can't ever see yourself willingly entering into a relationship with them, consider whether comp het is working on you.

For mspecs this can be a helpful term to throw over the table back at your parents when they ask when you're going to get a "real relationship".

This can be a helpful term to consider when asking "am I forcing myself to wear mascara because I feel this is the only way I look presentable or do I actually like mascara."

Or it can be a helpful concept to look back on when undermining our internalized ideals of misogyny, towards ourselves and others.

This is a helpful term to put in our tool boxes to talk about the harm the systems of patriarchy, classism, and racism impose upon us.

Comp het can help us to understand why so many people look down on polyamory as a legitimate way of life.

It can be a helpful term for aspecs who are trying to figure out if they really want to date/have sex, or if they just believe these are the only things that will make you happy.

In general

Compulsory heterosexuality is just another term to describe a system we are all intimately familiar with. But by giving us the words to describe our experiences, it gives us the power to communicate those experiences more effectively, and to possibly understand why we're experiencing them.

This is just a bare basic knowledge post.

Honestly if you have the ability to, as in your internet history is not monitored in the way my friend's is, I encourage you to go on the deep dive through the sources listed below. Many of them are honestly only 30 pages long, that's a relatively short read, and understanding queer theory like this not only helps you to understand your own identity, but the ways in which you are connected to the rest of the fellow queer community.

Sources

Lesbian Masterdoc

Queer Theory 101: Compulsory Heterosexuality

Compulsory Heterosexuality and Lesbian Existence

Normativities Defined

Taglist

I'm tagging blogs bigger than me so that this has an easier time getting passed around as I mainly talk about aspec issues because I am aspec, but as stated above, I wanted to make sure that queer people who's internet histories are monitored and are only able to find information through tumblr safely could do so.

@our-queer-experience @our-sapphic-experience @our-lesbian-experience @our-aspec-experience @our-polyamorous-experience @our-pansexual-experience @our-unlabelled-experience @our-aroace-experience @our-mspec-experience @our-questioning-experience @our-bisexual-experience

[hypoclericalcunt]

Comp het and internalised homophobia is very real. I knew that people could be gay, i had many queer friends, i would always think of myself as an ally, I always thought women were hot, it was always i support gay people, people can be gay, women are hot, but IM not gay. Definitely. Very straight. This is why I sympathise with Mike so much, I am so fucking gay, and it's not even the 80s so there's not as much homophobia as there used to be. My own friends had randomly asked me if I was gay I was like WHAT ? NO ! i used to have a MASSIVE crush on a friend of mine and she herself was bi and STILL i thought I was straight. lt feels so good to be true to myself and stop pushing that part of me away, I live in a conservative place with a conservative family, but my brother is a huge liberal, and STILL i felt unsafe. I knew about byler, I knew about MIKE'S comp het plot, and STILL I was like, he's gay, but IM not. No way.

Anyway I made this post because Mike's storyline means so much to me and to so many others. This is another reason why byler becoming canon would be huge and help SO many people.

[ramblingsfromthytruly]

no #1 piper mclean defender here going on a rant !!!

sooo jumping right into it :) her being all "i'm not a stereotypical feminine girl" kinda makes sense considering she's native american and ppl constantly sexualise girls of their culture. also the only female role models she would have had growing up would be women in the film industry and they aren't exactly NOT sexualised by public eyes. her first hand experiences with femininity have always been associated with inferiority and shallowness and surface level beauty.

also even if rick didn't intend for her to be queer from the start, she was VERY comphet lesbian coded. the way she always thought about jason was very reminiscent of when i was young and trying to convince myself i had a crush on this guy. also jason & piper's memories together were literally FAKED by hera. ppl talk about that when expressing admiration for jason but conveniently forget about it when it comes to piper like really?? and did i forget the daddy issues me & piper both share????

that girl had SEVERE insecurities about being incompetent (again, complicated relationship with femininity.. also among the 7) despite probably being the one who's single-handedly saved them from troubles the most number of times out of all the 7.

[heda-heather]

*exhales*

Can sapphic women go to therapy, please?

We’re all traumatized. It’s totally not our fault.

The patriarchy, the sexism intertwined with the homophobia, the comp het, the social and economic pressures of being a female who partners with other females, the emotionally unavailable parents, the siblings who just don’t get it, the predatory abuse of men who find it “hot”…

I repeat, it’s NOT our fault! We have had the world against us. But we have got to stop passing our trauma to each other. Because that IS in our control.

We’re capable of so much more. Sapphic love can be so, so beautiful. The emotional connection can be cosmic. (And it can make for such sensual intimacy on all levels). We need to cherish that. We need to stop abusing that.

Because this is all wrapped up in our fight for a better community, worldwide. Our love can be motivational, can be something to look to for guidance. We could be part of a revolution on how to love one another more fully. But only if we start taking care of ourselves and each other.

I love you all so much. I’m sorry our world has made it so hard for us. Be good to one another.

Each one of us is deserving of kinder love. ❤️

[moldyvhs]

[modernrifle]

no because this section of rots is literally insane??

like, in the first line, about padmé, the emphasis is placed on the word 'could', highlighting how devastating the act of someone close to him maybe betraying him was. it isn't particularly personal: it isn't about padmé, or their love, or even really anything aside from the action of cheating itself. he's hurt that someone in general was willing to inflict such pain on him. additionally, anakin's love for padmé is not love so much as it is a need for someone to protect, someone to whom he can prove himself worthy for, a person who he deems controllable, possessable. it's the betrayal itself that's tearing him apart, not padme, not her, but it, the action.

but then, when addressing obi-wan's place, the emphasis is placed on 'him'. it's not the fact that it happened, it's not the fact that obi-wan might have had the audacity to do it, it's the fact that it is obi-wan. it somehow seems more personal in the novel when anakin is addressing obi-wan, because it is not the loss of some symbolic person he told himself to love and protect that betrayed him, it's his brother, his mother, his best friend, his teacher, a person who is more than an idea to him, that hurt him.

so, basically, when it's padmè, anakin seems more hurt by the fact it happened, that the representation of his ability to protect and control hurt him, but when it's obi-wan, anakin cares less about the act itself and more about the person - obi-wan. it just is written to seem so much more personal, because anyone could do what padmé did, but only he could do it in a way that truly affected anakin on a deeper, more singular level.

[jelestes]

jelle x good luck babe!

a headcanon

_______________________________________________The first time she heard the song she was cleaning the house. Henry was scrolling to whatever social media teens were into these days and the melody got stuck in her head. She kept murmuring it for weeks, whistling here and there, it got to a point where she would mumble the melody in her sleep. It was an earworm.

She didn’t know the name of the singer nor the name of the song, she tried asked Henry but it was no use, he didn’t remember either. JJ was finally accepting she had no other choice but to drive herself mad trying to figure out the name of the song when Tara heard her mumbling the melody and stated — in what JJ could only describe as a mix of disbelief and surprise — that she would’ve never pictured JJ as a Chappell Roan listener. JJ was confused for a second but she connected the dots, gave Tara a shy smile and ran her hands trough her purse blindly grabbing her airpods.

As soon as she typed the singers name the song came on, it was like scratching an itch in her brain, she felt relieved. Then she heard the lyrics. Every new sentence hitting her harder than the prior. Her mind wandered to her.

Elle Greenaway.

Just the thought of her name sent a cold shiver down JJ’s spine. Elle was her first in many aspects, she was also her last. They had broken up before she ran away, she remembers perfectly.

Everything was going well, perfect even, JJ had never been that happy before and all it took to make everything crumble down was one phone call.

Her mom.

She could still hear Sandy begging, pleading with her to let this “nonsense” go, it’s been almost 20 years and till this day JJ is unsure on how her mom found out, what she knows for sure is that she should’ve never listened to it. She should’ve listened to Roslyn, she should’ve remembered that summer Roz caught her drawing hers and her middle school best friend name repeatedly inside a heart, she was so scared, tears were clouding her vision but she could see Roslyn smiling at her, the older sister kissed the top of her head, held one of her hands and said “It’s okay, Jayge. Don’t be afraid, you’re doing nothing wrong” then sat on the carpet and helped JJ finish her coloring. That’s what she should’ve remembered, not her mom’s poisoning words.

It was too late now, heck, it was too late then.

She remembered going down to Elle’s apartment the same night, she remembered telling her she was confused, she wasn’t sure anymore, she wasn’t into girls in that way, that this was all fun, it wasn’t serious. Elle thought she was playing at first but at the sight of the very real tears streaming down JJ’s face she knew it was over.

Then the fisher king happened.

JJ saw Elle crumbling before her eyes and she wanted nothing more than to hold her, to kiss her, to make it all go away but she couldn’t. She shouldn’t.

She tried to convince herself that their friendship would bounce back, that Elle would understand her, that they could be friends once this nightmare was over. But that never happened.

She never had the chance to tell Elle that she loved her. She was gone six months later, leaving only her badge, her gun and JJ’s bleeding selfish heart behind.

She received a letter a year later. Elle was doing okay, she met someone, she still thought of JJ, she hoped onde day JJ could break free from herself.

Then there was Emily.

JJ wasn’t sure when or how but she started feeling those feelings again, she couldn’t go there, not again. So she thanked the heavens when Will came along.

She liked Will enough, she could see herself with him. But she tasted Elle’s mouth when she kissed him, she missed Elle’s body when she was with him. She came close to breaking up with him so many times, but he was so nice, her mom adored him, he treated her right, he loved her and Elle was history.

Then life went on, as it always does.

Life gave her Henry and Michael, a stable relationship, a house, a husband that loved her and yet she still had this lingering feeling like a ghost that followed her around.

JJ got up from her desk, her airpods still on, the music still playing.

She opened her old office’s door, grabbed her keychain and opened up a drawer. She held onto the now 20 something old picture of her and Elle. She brushed her fingers across Elle’s face then touched the name, her name, stamped over the wrinkled old letter as the song went.

JJ did tried to stop to world, but she could never stop the feeling.

JJ was finally free.

[popstrologypod]

i hate male centered society so bad dude 😭

jewel on standing still:

the media on standing still:

NOT EVERYTHING IS ABOUT OR INSPIRED BY A MANNNNN 🗣️🗣️🗣️

this (obviously) pisses me off so bad about the reception to taylor’s songs too, like you don’t have to think taylor is gay in the SLIGHTEST to understand that so many of her songs aren’t about romantic relationships, but about her dad, fame, herself, her fans, the media, etc. but no! they’re just all about her exes 👹

[thedeathofthelamb]

women's attraction towards men is always wrapped up in fantasy. the minute that goes away, they get bored. super interesting lol

[assassinated-sunrise]

Me: *sighs*

Also me: *changes tumblr bios from "bi disaster" to "lesbian disaster" apparently*

[ramblingsfromthytruly]

me, a closeted lesbian who only two people in my life know about but i'm too scared to ever bring up my sexuality:

me, a lesbian who has never actually had a relationship or even "crush" on another girl yet could never imagine herself with a guy:

me, a LESBIAN: what if i'm faking??? what if i'm actually straight and i'm faking for attention????