Elsa Roberts Uncategorized

Fundamentalist Survivor: Staying alive while being Queer

Secular Woman's first article in the LGBTQ week Series

by Aaron Roberts

I'm queer. I can say it now with assurance, pride even, but it took many long painful years to get to this place. I started from a place where gay was sinful, gross, wrong, immoral. Where sex was hidden, something no one talked about. Where sexuality of any kind was looked on with deep suspicion and shame. I've peeled those layers of oppression off over the years and this is my story.

My parents strongly discouraged any thoughts of romance or sex while I was growing up. They made me feel it was wrong to be attracted to anyone regardless of sex or gender. They said it was wrong to have sex before marriage and that it should not be about pleasure. They made me feel like any sexual attraction was an unforgivable sin. I was terrified of being attracted to anyone. But when I was about 15 I couldn't help myself anymore.

At night I started having visions of being intimate with girls. At first I felt guilty because I thought it was wrong. My mind took over, and my fantasies turned to me getting raped by a woman. I thought that, "well, if its against my will then it's not my fault. Then, I won't be guilty."

As I got older I started doubting religion and everything I was taught. By the time I was 18, I was self identifying as Agnostic. As my religious beliefs began to fade, I felt less and less guilty about masturbating and having erotic fantasies. It was very liberating, now I was able to enjoy myself without feeling guilty. My fantasies became more varied, and I also learned that queer people existed and wondered what two men would do together sexually. I started having fantasies involving men, and enjoyed them.

When I started having queer fantasies it was hard for me to imagine being able to have a family because I'd never seen queer families. I thought that they wouldn't be accepted by society and that I couldn't have a queer family. I remember telling my sister, "I think I would like having sex with a man, but I don't think I could fall in love with one."

During this changing period, I went on 4-H exploration days. It was a program where kids would go to Michigan State University for 4 days. There were classes that taught a wide range of subjects. One year I took sailing and a drama/acting class. The classes weren't too involved, but it was enough to teach you about a subject and get you interested in it. We also got to go on an all day adventure away from the campus.

This particular year we went to an amusement park. At the amusement park I hung out with some boys that were in my same 4-H group and we went on some water slides. I remember being aroused by their naked chests.

We were assigned dorm rooms on campus during our classes and in our rooms the boys talked about masturbating among other general conversations. Before this point in my life, I'd never had the opportunity to be with my peers; therefore, I hadn't heard people talk so openly about what I thought were private, taboo topics. These experiences were very educational for me.

When I was seventeen, my parents let me put a door on my room, but I wasn't allowed to put a lock on it. I thought I was lucky because I had the only door in the house. My sisters and my parents didn't have doors to their rooms, and there was no door to the bathroom either, as our house was in a constant state of renovation and my parents didn't believe in giving us privacy.

But, since I had a door I felt safer exploring my sexuality and masturbating to porn. I would shut my door and watch porn, listening intently for my mother walking up the stairs. Usually I was able to hear her before she got to my room, so I would close the pornography and pretend I was just surfing the web or playing a game. She would just open my door unannounced and look at my computer to see what I was doing. I know she was scanning my window tabs for porn. She would accuse me of closing a page so that she couldn't see what I was looking at. Then she would tell me to go to bed and not stay up too late.

Because of my mother's unannounced "visits" to my room I started taking pictures of the porn with my parent's digital camera because then I could take it to bed with me. I thought that would be less risky. I had the foresight to swap out the memory cards so that my parents wouldn't find them in the camera but one night I forgot.

That next morning my father came in to wake me up and tell me to feed my horse. He saw the camera and tried to turn it on, but the battery was dead. I immediately asked him to let me see it. He sensed my anxiety and asked me why. I told him I took a silly picture of myself and wanted to erase it. He took the camera downstairs to find more batteries.

I quickly got up and dressed. I ran out to feed my horse. I was hoping to convince my father to let me have the camera back. However, when I got back inside he had told my mother. I went upstairs to my room because I knew I was doomed.

My mother and my father interrogated me about masturbating and my mother went on to tell me how disgusting and repulsive the pictures were; it was clear that she was referring to the gay pictures. She was equally upset about all the porn though. She was very grossed out by any references to sex. My mother then asked me how I would feel if other people were watching my sister like that. She was trying to make me feel guilty.

My mother then quizzed me if I watched porn with my friends. She told me that she was taking my computer away and I wasn't allowed to play computer games or use the Internet. She also said that I wasn't allowed to see any friends. She went on to say that from now on they would make me go to church with them every Sunday. I begged her to not tell anyone about my porn. She got so irate that she left the room and went downstairs.

My father was calmer. After my mother left the room he told me that he had been into things that were wrong when he was younger, and that he wanted to help me to not crave these evils. I'm not sure if he was talking about my sexuality or porn in general. I didn't say much because I knew that they were wrong but I couldn't argue with them.

One of the most upsetting parts about this was they ignored the sexuality issue completely. I knew they believed that gay people didn't exist and that gay sex was just evil and that there was no attraction between two people of the same sex. Because of this mindset my parents only saw porn and sex for pleasure as evil and a sin. The fact that it was gay porn made it no worse because being gay was just as sinful.

My mother said that they were taking me to see our pastor to talk about what happened. I was very upset because I had asked her not to tell anyone. My parents took me to the church to talk with the pastor.

The pastor and my parents started out by discussing my lack of faith. I told them that the biblical story was full of holes and that I didn't need religion to be good and moral. The pastor said that some people, famous atheists, come back to the lord. He also agreed that many people leave the Christianity.

He went on to discuss porn and the sex industry. He said it was evil and that the women were forced to participate. My mother sat there agreeing with him. He said that watching sexual images was wrong. He then went on to say that pornography led to homosexuality. My parents asked if I would be willing to meet with the pastor and talk more. They made it clear that if I didn't meet with the pastor I had to move out.

I was forced to see the pastor a couple times, and during our visits we talked and he tried to pressure me into reading a book about a crazy evangelical guy. The pastor and my parents basically wanted to convert me back to Christianity, convince me of the evils of pornography and get me to become ex-gay.

After this traumatic experience I became more reserved. I knew my life was over. This person was dead. It took me years to come out and be comfortable with myself. My family used religion to try and control my sexuality and it scarred me for life.

After this experience, about a year later, I moved out and started college. I played soccer and hung out with the soccer guys. I said I was straight and tried to be straight. It was a very difficult time for me because I was trying to be someone I wasn't. The soccer team was very homophobic also, which didn't help. I also tried to have sex with girls and began dating a girl for several months. I tried to make our relationship work but I just didn't feel an attraction for her. Finally, I came out as bisexual, which made her very uncomfortable. She was afraid I would leave her for a man. I was very sad that she couldn't accept me because I knew she had other friends in the LGBT community.

After I broke up with my girlfriend I started dating a guy who was a friend of my sisters'. I felt more comfortable with him right away, and I just knew inside that this was right for me. I'd never felt that way before. It's something that you can't explain with words.

Since I had a boyfriend it was easier for me to come out because all I had to do was mention my boyfriend. Most people at my work were friends of mine and so everyone would mention my boyfriend once in awhile in conversations. It didn't take long for every new employee to find out that I was queer.

One time I was working with a guy who I knew from a conservative family. I don't think he knew for sure I was queer, so one day he was goofing off and called me a faggot. I told him never to call me that again. He immediately became embarrassed and asked me what he could call me. I told him anything but a faggot.

One time another conservative guy made a comment about a customer who he heard over the headset saying, "Sounds like he plays for the other team." It was not necessarily a negative comment; he didn't have a negative tone, but, I knew the comment itself was heteronormative and homophobic. I was taken by surprise, but I also knew this guy wouldn't understand what heteronormative meant, so I just dropped my jaw and stared at him with the expression, "what the fuck?" I think he got the message without me saying a word.

Another time at work I was telling my co-worker about the night before when I ordered pizza for my boyfriend and I. The guy delivering supplies for the store overheard our conversation. After the delivery guy left my co-worker told me that he had asked about my sexuality and commented that he didn't know people were so open. I was surprised about this reaction because I assumed that he would have seen open people before. I realized how important it is to be open because other people notice it. If they are queer themselves it will help them feel more comfortable and if they are straight they will realize that queer people exist and are comfortable.

Now I know that I am queer and I am proud to be who I am. I define myself as queer because it is a broader term than gay. I think the term queer explains that I do not fit into normative gender identity and gender expression categories as well as covering my attraction to men.

For me, queer also encompasses how I don't fit with society on many levels. For example, I used to have a speech impediment and to this day sometimes it surfaces. I don't have the same values or beliefs, as most of my peers. I do not accept our capitalist, greedy mind set that so many do. I know that the clothes I wear have no bearing on my character. I have many terms to define myself; hard worker, liberal, atheist, humanist, queer, and survivor. But, although I happen to be queer and I am proud to be who I am, it is only a fraction of my being, my identity.

Elsa Roberts Article

Our Thoughts on Secular Exclusion from the Boston Memorials

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE

For more information, please contact:

Kim Rippere, Secular Woman President: 404.669.6727 E-mail

Elsa Roberts, Secular Woman Vice President: 906.281.0384 E-mail

Our Thoughts on Secular Exclusion from the Boston Memorials

Secular Woman is an organization which supports women without supernatural beliefs and works to ensure they have the opportunities and resources they need to participate openly and confidently as respected voices in every aspect of society including their government. When we come together as a society in light of tragedy it is important to ensure that people who have been affected have the resources they need to cope with the situation. Many people thrive on social support, which is partly composed of caring and motivating words from people who are seen as leaders within their community.

The percentage of those who are non-affiliated with any religion or are nonbelievers in the US is said to be as high as 20% of our population. When humanist and secular groups are excluded from services such as the interfaith service for the Boston bombings it erases them as a valid and important segment of the community and citizenry. It also denies many the grieving, mourning, and community they are craving during a time of upheaval. Excluding citizenry from a government sponsored and organized community memorial does not treat all citizens the same; it is unjust, discriminatory, and unconstitutional.

In the future when an occasion arises where coming together as a strong society is necessary, Secular Woman insists that secular community leaders also be chosen to show the passion we have to help our society heal.

###

Secular Woman is an educational non-profit organization whose mission is to amplify the voice, presence, and influence of non-religious women. For more information about Secular Woman visit: www.SecularWoman.org.

Secular Woman Member Articles

Call to Action: Provide Your Input on Tragedies and Inclusion

As part of a joint effort among national atheist and secular groups, and in partnership with Boston Atheists and the Humanist Community at Harvard, we want to educate public officials about the diversity of their communities in times of tragedy and atheists’ desire and need to be included.
Atheists are hurting from this news as much as anyone else, and part of the grieving process for atheists affected includes things such as representation at the official memorial service and in the community response. When memorial services include exclusively religious language,  atheists who are affected are excluded and shut out from the community.
We are asking you to assist us by writing a short paragraph that includes the following three things:
1) Who you are and whom you represent or speak on behalf of (e.g. Kim Rippere is President of Secular Woman);
2) Why you’re hurt by the exclusion from the memorial;
3) What you would like to see happen as a solution.
Greg Epstein fro the Humanist Community at Harvard is meeting with public officials to discuss this issue and would like to pass on responses from our community’s leaders. We also encourage you to solicit responses from members of your communities (if you run a blog, your readers; if you have a TV show, your viewers, etc) that he can include as well.
Please send your responses by early this week so we can make sure he gets them in time.
IMPORTANT: Please send your responses to [email protected] and encourage your fans/listeners to do the same.
Uncategorized

My Body the temple, my body the toilet

Fifth article in Secular Woman’s Sexual Assault Awareness Month Series

by Jennifer Forester

When I was five, I decided that I wanted to accept Jesus Christ as my Lord and Saviour, and I went through all of the motions: I asked him into my heart, assumed he accepted, and was baptized before the congregation. I remember vividly how afraid I was to be baptized; the thought of the water closing in over my head filled me with panic, but somehow I went through it, understanding that I had been washed in metaphorical blood and was now sin-free in the eyes of God. What was not possible for me to process in my gloriously naïve five-year-old brain was that, in return for the unconscionably horrifying experience of vicarious redemption, I had agreed to surrender my will to a being who could not express his will to me excepting through the men who controlled what ostensibly came from him. My body was to be a temple, a living sacrifice to God, and no one ever explained to me that, in the end, the difference between person as temple and person as toilet are negligible: they are both things. Neither have the will to decide what will and will not happen to or in them, and neither have the capacity to protest when their will is violated.

Naturally, being five, I didn’t hear much about sex, although I was raised much more openly than most of my Christian peers. The twisted fascination of the religious fundamentalist with the myriad manifestations of sexuality did not start to interfere with my awareness of the conflict between my Christian faith and my own desires until early in my adolescence as I—who had precociously noted the beguiling nature of my masculine peers years before my body signaled any sort of readiness for their attentions—became the recipient of male attention, welcome and unwelcome alike. As men began following me when I walked in public, as boys began to return my affections, the exhortations to purity began. Boys would want to do things to me, but I should not let them. I was to remember, at all times, that my body was a sacrifice to Christ and a gift to my future husband (who, presumably, would be returning the gift; at least there was no double standard in my household). What negativity did not seep down from my mother, who at the least had a truly egalitarian vision of mutual abstinence for Christians, worked its way in from elsewhere, poisoning my understanding of my body and its new, unfamiliar hungers. Sex was something that boys would want to do to me; it was not something that I would do or share. There was never any conception that I might be getting what I wanted out of some hapless boy; no, I was a vessel, for my God and for the men who would try to use me. My virginity would be a sacrifice to the man who would love me enough to wait until I was married, but a sacrifice it would be.

At fifteen, rather than losing my virginity in a thoughtless moment of passion as did so many of my fellow Evangelical kids, I made the calm, rational decision that I was ready to have sex with my fiancé who, at fourteen years old, was obviously as equipped as I was to enter into a healthy, mutually fulfilling sexual relationship. We spent days getting our plans together, making sure that we would have a plausible excuse to feed our parents—who were most certainly not in on this or supportive of it—and that we would have condoms, unlike our less fortunate peers who did not plan ahead. Although I was still a Christian, I never felt the cognitive dissonance, guilt, or fear that I should have had about this decision; somehow all of that didn’t leak down to me. No, what was missing for me was a concept as powerfully positive as the abstinence-only guilt is damaging: I lacked a model of consensuality. Lacking this, he and I, two children with only our religious and cultural messages to go by, proceeded to have sex in precisely the way that you would expect. He held me still while he painfully thrust in and out of me and then, while I lay on the floor bleeding and weeping, feeling every bit the living sacrifice I had pledged to be, he told me to put my clothes on so that he could play video games.

This never struck me as odd, never felt like the stab in the back that it should have; after all, I had simply transitioned from temple to toilet, and it was natural that he would use me in the same way that God used women: as an uncomplaining dispensary for bodily fluids and ideas about myself. The time before he finally, irrevocably raped me, under circumstances that I could point my finger at and say, “Yes, that was it!” was filled with a thousand little transgressions.

The time he wanted to have sex in a practice room and I was afraid that we would get caught, but he told me that I would do it if I loved him.

The time he convinced me to perform oral sex on him—an act I found repulsive at the time—by telling me that he would find someone else to do it if I wouldn’t.

The time I was about to move to another state and he broke down and cried until I would have sex with him in a movie theater because “he would miss me so much.”

The time he broke up with me but told me that he still wanted me and, as I wept, he pulled my shirt off of me and proceeded to use my unresisting body.

The times I fell asleep at his house and woke up with him rubbing his penis on my lips, the time his idea of experimenting with BDSM was to hold a butcher knife to my throat while I cried out that he was terrifying me.

This, all of this, building to the time when I would finally say the word “no” with enough emphasis that this constant, unrelenting assault on my body and mind became something that I would be able to, once and for all, definitively attach the word “rape” to, even if it took until a year later for me to be able to do so. I, the teenaged version of the good Christian five-year-old who pledged her body as a temple to the Lord, functioned as if I had pledged my body as a toilet for the boy-man whom I loved every bit as much as I had loved Christ before. My consent, my will, were irrelevant, and so I treated them as such, hollowed myself out to make room for the verbal abuse and the affection and the hatred and the jizz, if only he would love me the way that Christ had when I had given up my right to consent in my youthful naivete.

It’s enough to say that he held me down, that he called me a bitch, that he told me that I fucking wanted it and that I had it coming; it’s enough to say that I bled again this time and that I tried to fight him off. What’s striking isn’t the violence of what he did or the extreme duress under which it occurred. No. The part of what happened that is so shocking is that the only difference between the time when he finally raped me for real and the time when I consensually lost my virginity is that he cursed me and I fought back. The rest was the same: the bleeding, the pain, the fear, the utter disregard for my humanity, the casual walking away. There was little difference, to me, between what I called rape and what I called sex; I had never been given a model for it other than “what married people do,” leaving me with “crying and bleeding on the floor” as my default for what unmarried people did. My options were to consent to cry and bleed on the floor, or to be forced to do so. I laid myself out on the altar and called it consent, not knowing that there were other options. It was what good Christian girls did when abstinence failed them.

 

Elsa Roberts Press Releases

A Response to “An Open Letter to the Secular Community”

4/13/2013: UPDATED***

Today, the leaders of several prominent secular organizations published a document titled “An Open Letter to the Secular Community.” Our name is not attached, and our members may be wondering why Secular Woman declined to endorse this document. As a secular organization, our mission is to amplify the voice, presence and influence of non-religious women. We recognize that part of our mission takes place in online communities. Although promoting better online communication is a worthy goal, we reject the current statement’s conception of civil discourse because we feel that it gives equal voice to the sexist ideas and beliefs that have been perpetuated as differing “interpretations” of feminism.

The Open Letter contains a textbook definition of feminism.

The principle that women and men should have equal rights flows from our core values as a movement . . . We seek not only civil equality for everyone, regardless of sex, but an end to discriminatory social structures and conventions – again often the legacy of our religious heritage—that limit opportunities for both women and men.

It is confusing, therefore, that this same letter suggests that a significant problem with online communication is centered on the “debate” about the “appropriate way to interpret feminism.” At Secular Woman, the principle that “feminism is a movement to end sexism, sexist exploitation, and oppression” (Hooks, 2000, p. viii) is taken as a given, and not a topic for debate.

As a secular feminist organization committed to understanding and exposing societal constructs that contribute to the inequality of women and other oppressed groups, we have no desire to listen to, respect, or continuously debunk overtly sexist viewpoints. Just as most scientists are not interested in debating the beliefs of creationists, we are not interested in debating gender-biased, racist, homophobic, or trans*phobic beliefs. Although the document contains reasonable recommendations for increasing effective communication, some of these techniques have been used to silence women (and other oppressed groups). When people express opinions that challenge sexism ingrained in social structures and conventions they receive a significant amount of pushback and harassment. Those of us working to challenge systemic sexism should be under no obligation to listen to or be more charitable to our opponents.

Sincerely,

The Board of Secular Woman

Kim Rippere, President

Elsa Roberts, Vice President

Corinne Zimmerman, Secretary

Brandon Chaddock

Nicole Harris

Charlotte Klasson

Monette Richards

 

UPDATE (4/15/13):

1. The idea that “feminism is a social movement to end sexism” is a textbook definition. We are not interested in participating in diversionary conversations about ‘gender feminism’ or ‘equity feminism’ or whether the SCUM Manifesto represents our definition of feminism. It does not.

Feminism – defined simply as being against sexism – is one of our values. As such, it informs the way we approach the mission, vision, and strategic goals of our volunteer organization.

Proving that feminism is a valid worldview is something Secular Woman is not interested in pursuing. What we are interested in pursuing is the strategic goals that we have set for our organization.

2. Because of our Response  to the Open Letter, we have been criticized for not wanting to “listen to” or “be more charitable” to our opponents. This criticism suggests that we have shut down the dialog before even listening to the “opposing” side. The dialog concerning feminism and its role in atheism/secularism has been going on for some time now and we are aware of the great number of related conversations that have taken place in countless online forums, at secular conferences, and other venues. The formation of Secular Woman was a response to the ongoing “debate” about whether feminism has a place in the secular movement and community. We assert that it does. Because of this core value, we work from a viewpoint that takes the defining principles of feminism to be “self evident” (meaning we are not going to debate feminism’s validity; but are very open to discussions within a feminist framework).

Since conversations about the nuances of feminism are happening elsewhere, Secular Woman chooses to focus on its mission: promoting the voice and presence of non-religious women. We also choose to take the advice of Ron Lindsay (CFI President and CEO):  "Or, if one thinks enough effort has been spent on rebuttal, simply ignoring them."  

Secular Woman Her•Story

Her•Story: Nora Ephron

And every so often I’m with a group of people and you just run out of things to say and I say, “How many people believe in God?” In fact, the way we play the game is you have to guess how many people at the table believe in God. And it’s always more than I think it’s going to be. I’m always a little surprised that it’s even three out of eight.

Nora Ephron (May 19, 1941 – June 26, 2012) was a director, producer, screenwriter, novelist, playwright, and journalist. She was best known for writing the screenplays When Harry Met Sally and Sleepless in Seattle. Forever the motivator of woman and as a testament to feminism (qualities that Secular Woman holds dear) Ephron was quoted as saying, “Above all, be the heroine of your life, not the victim”.

Nora was born on May 19, 1941 in New York City to two Jewish screenwriters. Ephron, however, was not religious. “You can never have too much butter – that is my belief. If I have a religion, that’s it”. When she was four years old, she moved to Beverly Hills, CA. After she graduated from Beverly Hills High School in 1958, she moved to Massachusetts to attend Wellesley College, accompanied by her mother’s advice to avoid sororities and organized religion. There she majored in political science and wrote for the college’s newspaper.

After Nora graduated from college in 1962, she briefly interned in the White House and then became a “mail girl” at Newsweek for a year. Shortly after, she and a few friends started a satirical newspaper, which caught the attention of a New York Post editor who later hired Nora as a reporter. While working at the New York Post, she began writing essays for New York magazine, Esquire, The New York Times Magazine and other publications. Her humorous 1972 essay, “A Few Words About Breasts,” made her a household name. Over time, she began to create a name for herself as one of America’s best-known humorists. Now, also as a well-known essayist, she talked about a wide variety of subjects, including criticising her alma mater, Wellesley College, for turning out a generation of “docile” women.

Nora Ephron wrote her first screenplay for All the President’s Men at the request of Carl Bernstein, her then husband and Bob Woodward. Her script was not used in the end, but it did result in a screenwriting job offer by someone who had seen the script. In 1989, Nora experienced one of her greatest screenwriting success with When Harry Met Sally. She later transitioned to directing films in 1992 with This Is My Life, but the film turned out to be a box office disappointment. Still, ever vigilant, the next film she directed became a success: Sleepless in Seattle. These triumphs solidified Nora as the foremost creator of romantic comedies.

Along with her many acheivments in directing and screenwriting, Nora Ephron went on to pursue many projects, including playwriting. In 2006, she published a collection of essays, I Feel Bad About My Neck: And Other Reflections on Being a Woman, which quickly became number one on the New York Times best-seller list. She also blogged regularly for The Huffington Post.

Secular Woman highlights the life of Ms. Ephron who once said, “I certainly know I’m not going to be one of those people with a deathbed conversion”. Ephron died on June 26, 2012 from pneumonia, a complication resulting from acute myeloid leukemia.

More Information: Recommended Reading