Why coming in as Queer is just as important as coming out.

by Ciarra Jones

Coming in Queer is something that is scarcely given adequate attention. Rarely, if ever, has the media given us a chance to watch a Queer character grow into their Queerness. We love to broadcast over-exaggerated tropes wherein a Queer kid outs themself to their whole high school with a huge banner that says “I’m Gay.” But we never ask, I wonder how they are grappling with their sexuality, 10 years later?

The construction of “outness” is a fallacy, one that assumes that someone can ever truly be “out” to everyone. It’s impossible. I often argue that “outness” is a moment of realization of who one is in relationship to one’s self. For me, now that I am out to myself, sharing my identity with others means perpetually coming into myself. When I choose to share my sexuality with someone (I don’t share it with everyone) I am saying, it is important that you receive me fully in this moment because I know that I deserve to be loved holistically. When I “out” myself it is always with the caveat that I refuse to stay in community with the person if they prove themselves to be unloving. Thus when I come “out” to someone I am reminding myself that I am worthy of love and acceptance. It is less about their response and more an acknowledgement of my inalienable humanity. Coming out is an assertion of one’s right to be loved just as they are. Coming out is a consensual act of returning to ourselves again and again.

Despite my initial fears of exposure and vulnerability, coming into my Queerness became my armour against the intense scrutiny of academia. Coming in Queer, though jarring, reminded me of what my Queer friends and mentors taught me. In an academy based on critique and rejection, Queerness teaches us that critique is not our identity. To live in critique is to erase our multiplicity. Queerness says that this grade is not my identity, this classmate’s dehumanizing remark is not my truth because I am always worthy, just as I am.

Academia is steeped in an anxiety concerning progress and time. Students are always hustling to receive their next degree, to complete their next project and most importantly, many use their degrees, projects, and accomplishments as a means to receive outside validation. For many Queer people, we have developed a reservoir of self-love. We have revealed who we are to our friends, parents, and loved ones only to receive rejection in return. We quickly learned that we cannot live our lives predicated on outward acceptance because oftentimes acceptance for Queer people comes at the expense of our truths. Queerness reminds us to step out of both applause and rejection in order to look inward to ask the hard questions.

Perhaps Queerness protected me the most when contending with feelings of imposter syndrome. Queerness teaches us that true imposter syndrome is attempting to fit into molds that can no longer hold us. Due to the violence of our society's obsession with categorization, Queer people know what it is to be an imposter, for we are often forced to be imposters in our own bodies, performing identities that do not belong to us for the comfort of others. Coming into one’s Queerness is the result of doing the work of unlearning performativity and bravely embracing authenticity. This is not to say that imposter syndrome is not gendered, racist, classist, and extremely difficult to overcome. However, it is to say that Queerness beautifully speaks to these understandable feelings of mis-belonging by reminding us of the emptiness of making academia (or other professional pursuits) our sole identity. For a prerequisite to scholastic affirmation is running after success in perpetuity. Queerness disrupts the Western notion that worth and productivity are inextricably linked by prioritizing self-acceptance over that of temporary applause. Because to love our Queerness we must practice a rooted commitment to unlearning oppressive societal norms, Queerness shows us that true knowing is actually being brave enough to not know.

Academia, though at times beautiful and full of possibility, relies on capitalism and productivity as its framework for success. Productivity as a metric for success is corrosive because it steals our capacity for rest and steadfast self-love. Moreover, academia transforms each and every one of our colleagues into competition by encouraging academics to fear the possibility of being found wanting in comparison to another’s expertise.