"Same Love"

I'm way behind on this, seeing that there are 29 million views on this music video. I came across this song while I was at work and I was really impressed. Part of me questioned how genuine the message was, or if it was too cliché, but after watching interviews where the artist commented on this song, I was even more impressed and connected to the message. I talked to my friends about how I felt about it, and got their opinions too, but I wanted to write about this because it got me thinking about gender and sexuality. Of course, there are political implications to this song and message, but I'll leave that for another discussion.

The song starts with the artist's own stereotypes of what it meant to be gay. If you can draw and keep your room clean, you're gay. But if you're good at sports (little league), you might not be. He remembers the "preconceived ideas" of what it meant to like the same sex. I don't think this is too different than how the majority of people view sexuality. I've experienced this first hand, and I'm sure I'm not the only one. Admittedly, I've held my own stereotypes and sometimes I still catch myself stereotyping someone's actions based on sexuality. It's such a silly idea, really. If I dress a certain way or speak a certain way, sometimes people will ask me if I'm gay. Or if I dress differently or speak differently or try different things, people will say, "there's no way you're gay." It's funny that we think we can correctly label someone's sexuality simply based on what they do or how they look. I purposely like to play with this just to get people thinking.

How do you feel about sexuality stereotypes? When was the last time you judged someone's sexuality based on the image you perceived, and what did you do when you acknowledged it?