Puzzled by Guardian article

[TheSummerySilveryPussycat]

I hope it is OK to ask what this article means.
www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2022/may/30/i-am-queer-and-proud-even-though-i-am-now-married-to-a-man

So that they can put themselves into the 'I'm the most interesting and special' box?

It’s not… but the Eurovision party was in a gay bar. When you’re in a hetero relationship gay bars aren’t really the place to go hang out with your partner. It’s intrusive, and makes people uncomfortable mostly.

Who do you mean by “these people”?

Since most people are straight, bisexual people will have about 10x the number of potential opposite-sex partners compared to potential same-sex partners. So it's not surprising that many / most bisexual people end up in long-term heterosexual relationships.

I get that if being queer was a big part of your personal brand, then it might take a bit if adjustment. I found the article quite interesting on the topic, although the author does need to go on better dates.

Right so I'm the "wrong side of 50" (!) but I find it so puzzling that the younger generation (god I sound ancient) seems to kind of have this idea that bisexuality/heterosexualality/homosexuality and changing about etc is novel. It's been going on since time immemorial. Sort of thing you can imagine people not quite getting when they're 12 - 22 but any older than that.....?

Maybe it's because gay marriage is now legal and there's less to obviously rage about?

"your personal brand" maybe that's what it is? Sort of sexuality as consumerism?

People that write self absorbed articles in the guardian

I went from heterosexual to same sex after decades. I’m surprised at the continued prejudice - yeah, people shout stuff at you and you do sometimes have to explain in hotels that yes, you are on the same room number for breakfast and do want to sit together. But I’m also heartened by the widespread acceptance. Neighbours of all cultures have accepted it. I don’t think a pride flag would raise any eyebrows. Though this is social milieu dependent, I accept.

I feel completely normal and my Leisure time is spent in much the same way as when I was straight. It honestly doesn’t feel very different.

I’m bisexual and so is my partner and we would totally to a gay bar to watch Eurovision. But having said that we don’t feel a need to call ourselves queer or hang up rainbow flags in our window. We don’t find our sexual orientation interesting and don’t expect other people will find it interesting either.

I’m wondering what the OP found so confusing about the article.

Its not opaque or cryptic.

To be honest, there’s a whiff of sneeriness about some of the comments here.

It’s not self-indulgent, attention seeking, or showing need of therapy to write a short piece about a very real experience for a bisexual woman now in a same sex long term relationship.

It absolutely was self- indulgent and attention seeking. And she sounded a bit dim to be honest if the first place was her first choice for a night out in Prague.

and you do sometimes have to explain in hotels that yes, you are on the same room number for breakfast and do want to sit together

Really? Years ago when I was poorer than I am now I regularly had city breaks with a female friend where we shared a room. I never once experienced this.

I think this is the problem for me, that a lot of these types of articles or great announcements of identity lead me to say 'and so what'?

What has any of that got to do with me, Im not interested either way, why would I be?

My first 15 years of holidays were with female friends where we shared rooms and absolutely never came across confusion or hilarity about us sharing rooms

Well I'm with @Gadzookerykookery and relate to the article.

When I was in same-sex relationships I experienced constant low-level (and not so low-level) harassment for any and all public displays of affection. White van guys offering to 'show us what we were missing' on a weekly basis. General hostility and scrutiny.

Admittedly I've been married to a man for 10 years so things may well have changed - but at the time when we'd just started dating I was very aware that suddenly there's zero scrutiny or judgement or rolled eyes, and how bitingly unfair it was...

Straight women saying "I experienced no anti-gay discrimnation when on holiday with straight female friends" - well, duh?

I think if you aren't interested or don't like her writing, there's a lot else to read online. No need for this sneery thread which frankly does read as pretty homophobic.

Is this a new thing?
I'm in my 50s, married decades and used to go to loads of gay clubs in my youth, even with my husband. No idea we shouldn't be there. Probably around 50% of our friends were gay, so where should we have all gone to hang out together? We used to love gay pride back in the late 80s/90s as well.

I missed this post earlier, until I turned old and stopped going out to clubs and bars, my partner and I would only really go to gay bars because a group of our friends were gay, not all, we were a mixed group.

Ive never heard that I was being intrusive and making people feel uncomfortable. I wonder how I would have done that?

I genuinely didn't understand, was not sure of either the sex or the gender of the author or her partner, didn't know what they meant by "queer," which, as I am old once meant either "strange" or was a perjorative word for male homosexual. Then it was reclaimed, and it still meant male homosexual. And now it seems to mean something different again?

Also couldn't see why they couldn't go to a gay bar, I think I had the impression that they were accepting places and that sometimes non-gay people went to them.

Thanks for unravelling the article for me I am old enough that the word "gay," as in "happy and gay" [1950s-60s] has completely acquired a new meaning during my lifetime.

I wonder if it is quite a 'new' thing as someone else said above. Im going back to the late 80s and early 90s for my clubbing and nights out life, going to gay clubs in south London and down to Brighton if we had a driver was what we did. Why would it have changed now?

Those boring old straight people with their beer and fried cheese!

I’ve seen this article shared on Twitter and I don’t understand why people have a problem with it. She’s a bi-sexual woman who is now married to a man and is aware of the difference of how they are perceived as a couple as opposed to when she was in a couple with a woman.

Possibly because of the sneery tone of the article itself. The "I'm queer and I'm so cool, unlike you boring straights"

I am straight- I was specifically referring to the comment about being questioned about seating arrangements at breakfast. Never happened once. I doubt the person allocating me a table gave any thought as to whether the other person was my girlfriend or a girl friend.

That's absolutly what it is, that what identarianism is in general. The self as brand.

This! I regularly travel with a female friend & we share rooms and often a bed to save money (it allows for more wine & cake funds!) not once have we ever had even a vague comment or a look. Hotel staff have far better things to do with their time.

Do we need an explainer here on how travelling as a couple, in a relationship, as two same sex people, is different to travelling with a same sex friend?

What is going on with all these posts gaslighting away like crazy on the lived experience of travelling whilst lesbian?

Same with the gay clubs comments.

What you did in gay clubs as a big mixed group of mates in ten years ago has nothing to do with the writer feeling like it wasn’t cool to go into a gay club in Prague while on holiday with her husband.