Yesterday I faced my first experience of actual homophobic persecution.
I've been an out lesbian for almost 6 years now. My highly religious family know, my friends know, I’ve traveled the world and everyone I met knew and everyone who knows has been nothing but supportive. Both mine and my girlfriend's families embraced us and we've felt nothing but love from them all. Of course, I've known people who'd faced discrimination from family or supposed friends and although I wasn’t naive enough to think it would never happen to me, I was grateful that I'd never had to experience it and, after so long, had stopped worrying about encountering it. Which I guess is why it was so shocking to experience it at a family get together yesterday afternoon.
My girlfriend and I had driven the hour from Brisbane to the Gold Coast and arrived at my Aunt's house at about 2pm. Family from Sydney had been staying on the Gold Coast for Christmas and were leaving this morning so my Aunt was putting on an afternoon of drinks and nibbles so we could all spend time together and say goodbye before they left. I had called my Aunt earlier in the day to see if we could bring anything - she said no, to just bring ourselves.
Before we arrived I warned my girlfriend about my Aunt's boyfriend. They've been together for years, through multiple breakups, and even though he was a prick to my aunt, we all overlooked it at family events to keep the peace. I told her although he was a prick he usually put on a good show at family events and reserved his criticism for my aunt when they went home. Nobody likes him but they put up with him and include him in events and conversations for her sake.
So anyway, we arrived and did all the kisses and hellos and everyone was chatting away merrily. The boyfriend arrived and I said hello, he mumbled a ''hi' in response. Nothing out of the ordinary there. I got a drink for myself and Shan and we went to the balcony to wait for everyone to come out. We were outside for only a few minutes before my Mum came out and told us that we were leaving and going to her house. I asked why, and she said the boyfriend was 'going off his head'. Again, this wouldn’t be the first time so I followed her without question. I passed him on the way in and, thinking he was giving my aunt a hard time again, I looked him directly in the eye as I passed him going through the kitchen towards the door. It was only when no one else was leaving and my Nan said "sorry" as I was walking past that I really got confused. As soon as we were outside I asked mum what the hell had happened and all she said was "he doesn't agree with your relationship". I was stunned into silence. I knew he was a prick, but we've spent birthdays, Christmas's, Easter's etc in the same company and nothing had ever come up before, why now? I realised it was because it was his house we were in this time, and he didn't want us there.
As soon as we got in the car my mum text me and told us to come back to their house, where they all loved us and we could have dinner and watch a movie. But a couple minutes up the road I was too emotional to see them. I don't often cry and I could feel it building up and didn't want to show my family how much I was affected by it.
So we drove home in silence, with Shan holding my hand and telling me how much she loved me. But I couldn’t stop the tears. For the whole hour all I could think about was how I couldn't believe I'd ever gone out of my way to make him feel comfortable. But mostly I was upset that none of my family had followed us out. Why hadn't they stormed out in protest? I know they were put in a tough situation, not sure whether to be polite for my aunt's sake and stay, but if he had said anything negative about any of them who were there I know I would have been the first person out behind them.
My mum continued to text all the way home and finally sent a message saying they were coming to Brisbane just to hug us and then they'd leave again. I knew they would already be in the car and on their way so didn’t protest, just tried to compose myself before they got there. Honestly, I didn’t want to talk about it. I knew the way he was. It was a shock, but not a surprise. And the question I wanted answered, I wasn’t sure if I was ready for the response. "They didn’t follow you because...". I didn’t want to know.
In the elevator on the way down to let Mum and Dad in, I gave myself a pep talk knowing that if I started crying again, it wouldn’t stop and I didn’t want to be a mess in front of them. I was fine until we were walking back into the apartment and mum told me that my 21 year old cousin, the step daughter of the boyfriend, had lost it at him after we left so much so that they'd come to physical blows. As she towers a foot above him, I wasn’t immediately concerned with her safety, but I smiled to myself knowing that someone had stood up for me. Mum said after the fight he had retreated to his bedroom and locked himself in there.
In the time it took me to process this information and fight back more tears, my girlfriend had started talking to my mum about the new records we'd recently bought - a conversation I felt confident including myself in without any more emotion. They stayed for about an hour, not talking about what had happened, and then left.
About 30 minutes later I had a call from mum saying it was lucky we'd gotten home early, that they'd passed through a massive storm on the highway and that traffic going north was at a standstill because of two accidents. That’s my mum, always looking for the brightside.
Later in the night she called again. She had gone to my grandparent’s house when she got home and all the family was there. She said they were all shocked and disgusted with the boyfriend. She said my Nan had sworn never to speak to him again, my visiting family had blacklisted him then and there and my aunt was saying "this is it, it's over, I’m ending it with him". I know she won't end it with him, I wouldn’t expect her to because honestly, he's entitled to his opinion, and he's entitled to have those opinions in his own house. But it was nice to hear that no one agreed with him and that they all absolutely supported me and Shan. She said they'd all asked her to tell me they loved me and they were sorry we had to go through that.
It was during this phone call that I asked mum what had actually happened. We'd been outside and not heard a thing and except for "he doesn’t like your relationship", I didn’t know what had been said. Mum said she overheard him and my aunt bickering in the hallway not long after mum arrived. When she heard her name she stopped and listened and soon realised he was telling my aunt that he didn’t want us in 'his' house. With his foul mouth I'm sure it was a lot more colourful than that. Mum said it seemed like he was saying he'd just 'put up with it' while we were there but when she heard it was about us she went to our defense. Again, that's my mum. Although her religion doesn’t allow her to absolutely agree with my sexuality, she would never, ever let anyone speak ill of me or my sisters.
I'm ok now. I realise that what we experienced is nothing compared to what other people go through. I also realised how much my family does love me, that when put in that situation they stood up for us even when we weren't there. It has opened my eyes to the fact that even in a free country like Australia, this kind of persecution still takes place every day and it's given me a renewed vigour with which I plan to march at Brisbane Pride next year.
