The Trials and Tribulations of Being LGBTQ+ and Asian
LGBTQ+ Asian Americans share their experiences growing up
Culture clashes and intricacies of identity encompass the Asian American experience. For LGBTQ+ Asians, in addition to forging intersectional identities like many Asian Americans, they must also navigate self acceptance, cultural expectations and stigmas, and their precarious positions as queer minorities in an increasingly volatile America.
I had the extraordinary opportunity to speak with friends of mine who identify as Asian Americans in the LGBTQ+ community. They share their reflections on the past, their experiences coming out, and their advice to the future generation of LGBTQ+ Asian Americans.
Henry (he/they) was born in Salt Lake City, raised in San Diego, and is currently situated at Berkeley. Henry is studying Civil & Environmental Engineering with a minor in Public Policy at UC Berkeley. Henry identifies as gay.
Susie (she/her/hers) was born and raised in Los Angeles and is studying Integrative Biology at UC Berkeley. Susie identifies as bisexual.
Anh-Tu (he/him/his) was born in Ho Chi Minh City, Vietnam and raised in Orange County, CA. He is studying Operations Research and Data Science at UC Berkeley. Anh-Tu identifies as gay.
How have cultural expectations in sexuality played a role for you growing up?
Henry: For anyone who isn’t straight and/or cisgender, there is inherently going to be a process of realization, coming to terms with, and navigating your sexual identity. For everyone, the default assumption is that you’re heterosexual until otherwise stated or suggested; that’s simply a fact of the society and culture that we exist in. For me, not being straight was terrifying as I grew up because I felt the need to be perfect in every other aspect of my life — as a student, friend, brother, and son. Not being straight essentially equated to imperfection to me at the time, and while growing up, I wasn’t prepared to challenge such notions of perfection or to embrace my queerness.
Susie: A big part of South Asian culture, especially when you’re a girl, revolves around the idea of marriage. Bollywood plays out weddings and relationships too; so growing up, I culturally always felt like I would have to be the “good wife” to a man. This was so intrinsic to my culture when I was younger, that I didn’t even realize I was being primed for this heteronormative (and often misogynistic) role. I have finally come to terms with this as I’ve grown up, and while I appreciate the beauty and grandeur of Indian weddings, I’m not so sure it’s something I want in my future.
Anh-Tu: I don’t think it affected me a lot in the sense that I grew up in a pretty heteronormative environment. My parents never really pushed me to (not) date and I don’t think I personally knew anyone who was overtly homophobic or transphobic. Because of that, I think I had a pretty normal childhood and teenage-hood as I just subscribed to the status quo and didn’t think much about my sexuality as I never felt the pressure to date, both in and outside of school. There was an instance where a friend asked my Sunday Buddhist school teacher if homosexuality is okay in Buddhism (I pretty much knew I was gay at the time), and they said no, but I also just view religions as philosophies, so I didn’t pay much attention to it.
Before you came to terms with your sexual orientation, what were you like?
Henry: It’s interesting because I think that most people might still describe me as reserved now, and I am in some respects, but now I will definitely speak up when I am or feel prompted to do so. Before I really accepted myself, I was similar — fairly quiet and self-reserved — so it wasn’t too difficult to conceal my identity. I do think however, that many of the qualities that I held in being determined, self-motivated, and grounded in my roots still hold true now as they did then. Accepting and learning to love my sexuality did wonders for my self confidence and has helped me on my path to becoming more assertive and comfortable with myself in any space that I’m in.
Susie: I threw myself into schoolwork. I started questioning in high school, and decided that thinking about these things was too stressful and anxiety-provoking so it would just be best to distract myself with productivity. While there are definitely unhealthier coping mechanisms out there, this period of my life was characterized by extreme stress and anxiety if I ever stopped to self-reflect. Right before I decided to come out to myself, I also battled with depressive thoughts surrounding my identity.
Anh-Tu: I think that generally, I was a pretty shy, quiet kid/teenager. My parents always joked that I’ve always had a lot of girl friends and didn’t talk much to boys who were my age. I think that I was just a stereotypical gay man where I just naturally gravitate towards being friends with girls more, even when I wasn’t out. I was pretty self-conscious of my lack of male friends, and I tried to compensate for that lack of masculinity by joining cross country in middle and high school and playing League of Legends, two things that I didn’t enjoy. Additionally, I was sometimes also self-conscious of my sexuality, and would tell all of my friends that I have crushes on girls in order to hide my sexuality, as I didn’t personally know anyone who was out that could help me feel comfortable with being the first one to come out.
Tell us the story about how you knew you weren’t straight.
Anh Tu: I first had a crush on my closest guy friend that I was assigned to sit behind in my first period of junior high. I didn’t know that it was a crush back then, but I liked hanging out with him a lot because it was the first time that I had a close straight guy friend. I think I realized it was a genuine crush in 9th grade when we stopped having classes together and therefore talked less as I began to explore why I felt sad after we stopped being close. I continued to have my crush on him all throughout high school, but kept my distance as I didn’t really know how to explain my feelings and wanted the feelings to go away but it never did. It wasn’t until after I graduated from high school that I came into terms with my sexuality. This realization culminated when I took a solo trip to New York City during that summer, and attended Pride in 2016. There, I got to talk to a straight couple about how they were there because their daughter is lesbian and wanted to show support. In that moment, I realized that it was okay to be out as I looked around and saw many people in their authentic self.
Susie: I had a HUGE crush on Vanessa from Phineas and Ferb, even though I never admitted that to myself when I would watch Disney Channel as a kid. I also developed feelings for my high school bestie during our senior year, and shut her out when I couldn’t figure out how to deal with my emotions. When I met my now-girlfriend (also a Muslim South Asian woman) she had been out of the closet for some time and told me about her experiences with accepting herself. Hearing this, I realized that I had experienced practically the same thing my whole life. While I was scared at first, I came to the conclusion that this is who I was, and that I had to accept who I was in order to improve my mental health. Now, I still think back to small life events that suggest I was queer, and it’s nice to reflect upon how much I’ve grown.
Henry: I think that it’s much easier for me to say in hindsight that I’ve always known. As I recall my childhood and youth, I can pinpoint a number of instances where I’d feel this pull or attraction to the male body/anatomy even if I didn’t know what any of that or being gay meant at the time. I’ve also always had stronger feminine attributes to me than many of my male peers; though this might also have been a result of being brought up and surrounded by powerful women as I grew up. None of these things really pieced together until I reached adolescence and curiosity started to creep in. By the time I arrived to my teens, I also came to the terrifying realization that I was unlike many of my peers and differed from all of the people I’d been conditioned to idolize. I was initially distraught, but quickly pulled myself together and decided there wasn’t much I could do about it, so I just pushed it aside and concealed it as best I could — focused on everything else happening in my life — but this task was much easier said than done.
Tell us the story about how you came out to your family. Was their reaction what you expected?
Henry: Unfortunately, I didn’t get the chance to come out to my mom before she passed away in 2015, but there’s that saying that “mothers always know” and there’s a piece of me that would like to believe that she did know and was supportive. The first two people I came out to were my older sisters — in writing because I wasn’t yet ready to face someone with these revelations. I came out to my best friend a few months later, and then the rest of my family found out with my classmates when I first publicly came out during my high school graduation speech. I had many of the same fears that other LGBTQ+ people have — being rejected or ostracized, facing denial, or violence, homelessness, or efforts of conversion at the extreme. But I also knew my siblings well enough to know that I wouldn’t have to confront any of these with them, I knew they would be supportive; my struggle was more with opening myself up and allowing myself to be vulnerable. Let it be known that coming out is an ongoing and continuous process, but it gets easier as you do it more and more; the standard however, should be that no one should have to “come out.”
Susie: I came out to my family when I was hospitalized in a psych ward after I had attempted suicide. It was a really dark time in my life, and I thought “Hey, might as well get this over with since we’re at rock bottom already.” It was difficult to understand how they took it, but I feel like their reaction was cushioned by the fact that I was in a vulnerable place. I gave them a little backstory about how I realized I liked girls as well as boys, and I even told them about my relationship with my girlfriend. It was so scary and I don’t think I could ever do it again, but I am glad that I told them because it allowed them to see things from my perspective. It was also helpful to come out to them because much of my depression stemmed from the belief that my family would disown me if I ever came out to them.
Anh Tu: In general, my family doesn’t talk about relationships that much and I never exactly came out to my parents. I think they always knew when they saw that everyone I hang out with often are girls. Additionally, during my first year of college my mom would ask if I liked boys or girls, and I didn’t think that a parent who didn’t suspect anything would ask their child that. Because of that, I didn’t have any expectations or fears about coming out to them as they pretty much already knew. I did come out to everyone else after my trip to New York over social media, and there weren’t any negative reactions.
After you came out, how did your attitude towards yourself and the world change? Did your cultural heritage and identity ever clash?
Henry: It wasn’t so much the act of coming out that changed me, but rather the steps that I took to get there, and the steps that I took afterwards. I charted down this path of self-acceptance and self-actualization. Once I was honest with myself and the world, I then started building my self-comfort and confidence; these allowed me to deconstruct the stigma, take ownership of myself and to demand what I needed and wanted out of my life. I was never super close to or anchored by my Khmer roots, so there wasn’t much of a cultural clash there. I instead set forth on a journey of constructing myself and my identity with only a mapping of my own individuality.
Susie: After I came out, I decided to actively seek out LGBTQ+ South Asian representation. I followed social media accounts, joined a queer South Asian club, and found that people like me really did exist! It was really affirming to find these communities because I felt validated about my own identity. I began to accept myself more and started to appreciate queer and South Asian culture even more. Finding these safe spaces gave me a place to turn whenever identity clashes did happen, and for that I am so grateful.
Anh-Tu: After coming out, I felt like it was easier for me to be myself. I think that spending 6 years at the same school in addition to keeping a big part of me hidden made me keep a lot of things to myself. After coming out, I became a lot more open about who I liked and about myself in general. That helped me to develop closer relationships with the people around me. Additionally, I think that leaving the bubble of Orange County and coming out brought out a more extroverted side of me as I learn to interact in new environments and meet new people. I don’t think that my culture and heritage clashed with my identity as my family is generally socially progressive. Even in Vietnam, the culture is not as oppressive to LGTBQ+ individuals as same-sex sexual activity are legal and are believed to never have been criminalized in Vietnamese history and the country’s biggest cities host annual Pride parades.
What is the biggest challenge you have faced as an LGBTQ+ Asian?
Henry: There is a stark lack of representation and visibility of LGBTQ+ and Asian-identifying people — this makes it incredibly difficult to believe or understand that someone with my intersecting identities can exist and belong in our society and world. Further, the truth is that racism also exists within queer and trans communities as well. These problems and systems of oppression are intersectional; it is my hope that I can be visible for other queer and underrepresented racial minorities seeking role-models.
Susie: There isn’t really a bunch of mainstream representation of queer South Asians, so sometimes people don’t “expect” me to be queer, or to have a girlfriend. It’s annoying at times but it reaffirms the idea that I’m shattering these people’s expectations of what queer people look like. It truly makes me feel powerful and badass.
Anh-Tu: The biggest challenge for me growing up was finding other queer people in my communities. I never really had any queer friends that could help me understand my identity better and it wasn’t until I took a gap year in Senegal, where I met queer friends, that I really came to understand the intricacies of my queer identity
What is your advice to young LGBTQ+ Asians navigating life during these uncertain times?
Susie: Hang in there. It’s your decision whether you want to incorporate your sexuality with your culture, especially if you come from a homophobic family. In the end, just remember that there’s a lot of us out there, and most of us love making new friends!
Anh-Tu: Find queer friends who might have gone through or are currently going through similar experiences. With the advent of social media, there are a lot of support communities online. I think navigating sexuality, especially when you’re young, can be lonely as you don’t know who you can and can’t trust. Having a mentor or friend can make the process less lonely and isolating.
Henry: In all honesty, it’s hard and I can’t promise that it’s going to get easier, but I can say that as you grow and change, you also get stronger and that makes it more bearable. Even in the face of great uncertainties, be certain about yourself, your right to exist, and the validity of your experiences. Invest in the inner work of understanding yourself and loving yourself so that you can then show others how to understand and love you too.
