Heteronormativity And Narcissism
Heteronormativity and narcissism correlate negatively due to the tendency for narcissistic people to become overconfident in their own beliefs, causing issues to grow between different sexualities. This correlation comes from narcissism’s root in the self-esteem education program, where children are treated with unconditional positive regard, where they are taught to consider themselves “special” no matter their actual achievements (Twenge 765). After being taught that their own ideas are already praiseworthy and have no need to listen to anyone else’s ideas, children constantly pick out other perspective’s faults while defending their own. Instead of attempting to find reason in one another’s beliefs and find common ground, each group strives
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to point out faults in the other while defending themselves from the other group’s attacks, in an attempt to confirm their own narcissistic superiority. Due to narcissism, people of the LGBTQ community are becoming even more confident with their own opinions. This confidence can be clearly seen in John Corvino’s article, “What’s Wrong With Being Gay?”, where the author lists out and counters the arguments against homosexuality: religious texts, dangerous lifestyle, unnatural to reproduction, and moral issues. Yet, he illustrates how easy it is to simply not accept these arguments at all from the very beginning, where the author wonders how exactly he could convince someone who could easily just say, “‘That’s exactly what a Deceiver would say!’”(Corvino 4). With this text from his book, it becomes clear how determining sexuality’s validity is clearly subjective, depending on the person’s perspective and the strength of their beliefs. Due to the subjectivity of the concepts, it is truly impossible to argue whether or not something is correct or not depending on how many things are viewed, leading to constantly growing conflict between the two issues. The effects of narcissism plays an especially large role in this stagnation, causing each side to be able to ignore the other’s arguments when their own beliefs are in a dire situation. As society tends to define the concept of sexuality as something concrete and defined by actions, all arguments become quite subjective to perspective, making it more difficult for society to accept the concept of sexual fluidity. Only by sharing and understanding the viewpoints of one another can the two sexual groups find common ground. Yet, narcissism prevents opposing groups from properly observing each other’s perspectives, making it essential to first resolve the issue of narcissism to, in turn, resolve the issues between the two sexual groups.
The times at which narcissism emerges and the movement against heteronormativity emerges seem to encourage the existence of a connection between narcissism and the conflict of sexuality.
Twenge defines the beginning of the roots of narcissism with the self-focus movement of baby boomers in the 60’s before self-focus “blossomed in the 1970’s” (Twenge 760). At the same time, although the LGBTQ movement was already in motion long before the 70s, a much more radical movement began in 1969 when a group of lesbians and drag queens resisted a police raid. Police raids on gay bars may have been commonplace at the time, but the people actually resisting these raids were not (Arriola 60). While tension between the LGBTQ community and the rest of society grew in the 60’s, society continued to explore the concept of self-esteem. Encouraged through repeated frustration and their growing self-esteem, the LGBTQ community began the 1969 Stonewall Riots, marking the beginning of an increasingly radical fight against discrimination caused by heteronormativity. Yet, after the conflict became even more radical between the two parties, tension continued to rise due to increased conflict and the self-focus “becoming more mundane” (Twenge 760). The constant rise of both conflict and narcissism creates a loop that will cause conflict between heterosexuals and the LGBTQ community to continue to rise to an extraordinary level. As narcissism continues to be encouraged in Generation Me, conflicts between heteronormativity and the LGBTQ community have also only continued to rise. The way the time frames for the emergence of narcissism and the beginning of a more radical LGBTQ movement coincide at the start of the 70’s and each seem to influence each other seems to indicate correlation.
Issues between heteronormativity and the LGBTQ community continue to occur today in the form of both macro and micro aggressions. Macro aggressions continue to
occ
The way that LGBTQ sexualities are treated as one group while resisting heteronormativity by most of society also causes issues in the LGBTQ community itself, as it prevents people from being able to see the more nuanced differences between different types of sexualities. Rather than understanding each different sexuality apart from one another, every single type of sexuality different from heterosexuality is shoehorned into one community. Although this grouping is understandable because of the singular goal against discrimination from heteronormativity that all of LGBTQ community sexualities have, people should make more of an effort to understand how each community continues to have further divisions that further diversify each individual sexuality. For instance, Adam Isaiah Green refers to a lesbian community in Cherry Grove, where “Ladies”, “Dykes”, and “Postfeminists” lived together, each group divided by their social and economic status (Green 527). These divisions in the lesbian community is something that no one would notice while pursuing an overall LGBTQ agenda, only each sexuality individually. Therefore, the issues between sexualities can be seen within what we normally consider as the whole of the LGBTQ community. Not only that, but some people don’t acknowledge the viability of certain other sexualities, like bisexuality or pansexuality. People tend to overlook the excess of differences in favor of a common attack against heteronormativity, but could easily prove an issue if the LGBTQ community gets its way. With the ideas of sexuality, people are too different from one another and cannot properly connect with those of other sexualities. Only by providing a common ground for all sexualities can people truly understand and connect with each other. The heteronormative construct of today’s society is difficult to change and also causes issues within the opposing LGBTQ community as well.
Narcissism continues to make it difficult to allow people to see this common ground, as, to each side, it simply appears to be another side of opposition to their own beliefs. Sexual fluidity seems to only serve to give another option for people to believe in. Currently, many people fight against the idea of heteronormativity because they believe that their own sexuality should also be accepted by society. Meanwhile, others encourage heteronormativity because they simply believe that it is correct based off of their own reasoning. Each side seeks out evidence specifically to support their own ideas and counter opposing ideas. It is important to realize how sexual fluidity should be truly presented in order to be a valid common ground. To remove all notions of sexuality is something that some people may reject even more fiercely, as it still encroaches on their idea of their own identity. Should someone’s identity be challenged in a significant way, it often proves difficult for them to be accepting of what other people are saying. Often times, narcissism can cause normalcy bias, where others to refuse to believe what disagrees with their own beliefs even under extreme circumstances. In the book, “When Prophecy Fails”, Leon Festinger conducted a study to test the normalcy bias on a group of cult members, who, through the messages received by a chosen messenger, believed that aliens would come take them away at a set apocalyptic date. Through the length of the entire day they waited, calling every passing hour from the set time a mere delay. Finally, even when their saviors didn’t come and the world did not end at the end of the day, they immediately rationalized the issue by stating “the little group in, sitting all night long, had spread so much light that God had saved the world from destruction” (Festinger 169). Rather than crushing their beliefs, the prophecy’s failure only served to amplify the cult’s beliefs so that they to prophesize a further date for the apocalypse. Even under such extreme circumstances, narcissism, which encourages confidence in one’s own beliefs, can continue to cause people to rationalize for further possibilities that support their own beliefs. It is clear that the only way to successfully eliminate the conflict between different sexualities is to validate the beliefs of both sides, to appeal to their feelings of narcissism.
Therefore, although sexual fluidity could be seen like just another view of sexuality that both the LGBTQ community heterosexuals may fight against, it actually links into both sides of the conflict. Common ground can be found in the way couples of all sexualities tend to have the same traditional gender roles, feminine and masculine. Typical heterosexual relations have a dominant masculine role and a submissive feminine role. Adam Green noted that, “as a consequence of masculine socialization, gay men were found to reproduce traditional gender norms and practices in the construction of masculine personas and presentational strategies” (Green 531). This means that male homosexuality still follows the same presentation of masculine and feminine characteristics, found through the separate personas of masculine homosexuals and “fairies”, feminine homosexuals. They each play their own dominant and submissive role in the relationship and also during sexual relations, fairies typically the ones being penetrated (Ward 534). Judith Butler also finds that “there is no volitional subject behind the mime who decides as it were, which gender it will be today” (Butler 315). Although it may be possible for people to dress up in drag to mimic other gender’s characteristics, gender ideologies are already determined, unaffected by a change in outer appearance. People will continue to play either a masculine or a feminine role in their relationships no matter what their biological sex appears. Gender ideologies and social roles therefore play a large role no matter which sexuality they are involved with. The fact that biological sex does not affect one’s inherent gender ideology seems to support the idea of sexual fluidity as well. Rather than having a solidified sexuality, it is more plausible that one’s sex according to gender ideologies becomes the role that they would take in a relationship. Solidified biological sexuality serves only to limit the perceived types of relationships a person could be in rather than the role they take inside of all relationships. Ward already demonstrates how a man can be both hetero and homo sexual at the same time, yet take a dominating, masculine position in both roles (Ward 62). Having a solidified gender role appearance, people can really be any kind of “sexuality”. While sexuality can be fluid and difficult to define according to each person, Ward and Butler suggest the idea of sexual fluidity, where the way people act according to gender ideologies continues to be more or less the same no matter the sexual relations.
to point out faults in the other while defending themselves from the other group’s attacks, in an attempt to confirm their own narcissistic superiority. Due to narcissism, people of the LGBTQ community are becoming even more confident with their own opinions. This confidence can be clearly seen in John Corvino’s article, “What’s Wrong With Being Gay?”, where the author lists out and counters the arguments against homosexuality: religious texts, dangerous lifestyle, unnatural to reproduction, and moral issues. Yet, he illustrates how easy it is to simply not accept these arguments at all from the very beginning, where the author wonders how exactly he could convince someone who could easily just say, “‘That’s exactly what a Deceiver would say!’”(Corvino 4). With this text from his book, it becomes clear how determining sexuality’s validity is clearly subjective, depending on the person’s perspective and the strength of their beliefs. Due to the subjectivity of the concepts, it is truly impossible to argue whether or not something is correct or not depending on how many things are viewed, leading to constantly growing conflict between the two issues. The effects of narcissism plays an especially large role in this stagnation, causing each side to be able to ignore the other’s arguments when their own beliefs are in a dire situation. As society tends to define the concept of sexuality as something concrete and defined by actions, all arguments become quite subjective to perspective, making it more difficult for society to accept the concept of sexual fluidity. Only by sharing and understanding the viewpoints of one another can the two sexual groups find common ground. Yet, narcissism prevents opposing groups from properly observing each other’s perspectives, making it essential to first resolve the issue of narcissism to, in turn, resolve the issues between the two sexual groups.
The times at which narcissism emerges and the movement against heteronormativity emerges seem to encourage the existence of a connection between narcissism and the conflict of sexuality.
Twenge defines the beginning of the roots of narcissism with the self-focus movement of baby boomers in the 60’s before self-focus “blossomed in the 1970’s” (Twenge 760). At the same time, although the LGBTQ movement was already in motion long before the 70s, a much more radical movement began in 1969 when a group of lesbians and drag queens resisted a police raid. Police raids on gay bars may have been commonplace at the time, but the people actually resisting these raids were not (Arriola 60). While tension between the LGBTQ community and the rest of society grew in the 60’s, society continued to explore the concept of self-esteem. Encouraged through repeated frustration and their growing self-esteem, the LGBTQ community began the 1969 Stonewall Riots, marking the beginning of an increasingly radical fight against discrimination caused by heteronormativity. Yet, after the conflict became even more radical between the two parties, tension continued to rise due to increased conflict and the self-focus “becoming more mundane” (Twenge 760). The constant rise of both conflict and narcissism creates a loop that will cause conflict between heterosexuals and the LGBTQ community to continue to rise to an extraordinary level. As narcissism continues to be encouraged in Generation Me, conflicts between heteronormativity and the LGBTQ community have also only continued to rise. The way the time frames for the emergence of narcissism and the beginning of a more radical LGBTQ movement coincide at the start of the 70’s and each seem to influence each other seems to indicate correlation.
Issues between heteronormativity and the LGBTQ community continue to occur today in the form of both macro and micro aggressions. Macro aggressions continue to
occ
The way that LGBTQ sexualities are treated as one group while resisting heteronormativity by most of society also causes issues in the LGBTQ community itself, as it prevents people from being able to see the more nuanced differences between different types of sexualities. Rather than understanding each different sexuality apart from one another, every single type of sexuality different from heterosexuality is shoehorned into one community. Although this grouping is understandable because of the singular goal against discrimination from heteronormativity that all of LGBTQ community sexualities have, people should make more of an effort to understand how each community continues to have further divisions that further diversify each individual sexuality. For instance, Adam Isaiah Green refers to a lesbian community in Cherry Grove, where “Ladies”, “Dykes”, and “Postfeminists” lived together, each group divided by their social and economic status (Green 527). These divisions in the lesbian community is something that no one would notice while pursuing an overall LGBTQ agenda, only each sexuality individually. Therefore, the issues between sexualities can be seen within what we normally consider as the whole of the LGBTQ community. Not only that, but some people don’t acknowledge the viability of certain other sexualities, like bisexuality or pansexuality. People tend to overlook the excess of differences in favor of a common attack against heteronormativity, but could easily prove an issue if the LGBTQ community gets its way. With the ideas of sexuality, people are too different from one another and cannot properly connect with those of other sexualities. Only by providing a common ground for all sexualities can people truly understand and connect with each other. The heteronormative construct of today’s society is difficult to change and also causes issues within the opposing LGBTQ community as well.
Narcissism continues to make it difficult to allow people to see this common ground, as, to each side, it simply appears to be another side of opposition to their own beliefs. Sexual fluidity seems to only serve to give another option for people to believe in. Currently, many people fight against the idea of heteronormativity because they believe that their own sexuality should also be accepted by society. Meanwhile, others encourage heteronormativity because they simply believe that it is correct based off of their own reasoning. Each side seeks out evidence specifically to support their own ideas and counter opposing ideas. It is important to realize how sexual fluidity should be truly presented in order to be a valid common ground. To remove all notions of sexuality is something that some people may reject even more fiercely, as it still encroaches on their idea of their own identity. Should someone’s identity be challenged in a significant way, it often proves difficult for them to be accepting of what other people are saying. Often times, narcissism can cause normalcy bias, where others to refuse to believe what disagrees with their own beliefs even under extreme circumstances. In the book, “When Prophecy Fails”, Leon Festinger conducted a study to test the normalcy bias on a group of cult members, who, through the messages received by a chosen messenger, believed that aliens would come take them away at a set apocalyptic date. Through the length of the entire day they waited, calling every passing hour from the set time a mere delay. Finally, even when their saviors didn’t come and the world did not end at the end of the day, they immediately rationalized the issue by stating “the little group in, sitting all night long, had spread so much light that God had saved the world from destruction” (Festinger 169). Rather than crushing their beliefs, the prophecy’s failure only served to amplify the cult’s beliefs so that they to prophesize a further date for the apocalypse. Even under such extreme circumstances, narcissism, which encourages confidence in one’s own beliefs, can continue to cause people to rationalize for further possibilities that support their own beliefs. It is clear that the only way to successfully eliminate the conflict between different sexualities is to validate the beliefs of both sides, to appeal to their feelings of narcissism.
Therefore, although sexual fluidity could be seen like just another view of sexuality that both the LGBTQ community heterosexuals may fight against, it actually links into both sides of the conflict. Common ground can be found in the way couples of all sexualities tend to have the same traditional gender roles, feminine and masculine. Typical heterosexual relations have a dominant masculine role and a submissive feminine role. Adam Green noted that, “as a consequence of masculine socialization, gay men were found to reproduce traditional gender norms and practices in the construction of masculine personas and presentational strategies” (Green 531). This means that male homosexuality still follows the same presentation of masculine and feminine characteristics, found through the separate personas of masculine homosexuals and “fairies”, feminine homosexuals. They each play their own dominant and submissive role in the relationship and also during sexual relations, fairies typically the ones being penetrated (Ward 534). Judith Butler also finds that “there is no volitional subject behind the mime who decides as it were, which gender it will be today” (Butler 315). Although it may be possible for people to dress up in drag to mimic other gender’s characteristics, gender ideologies are already determined, unaffected by a change in outer appearance. People will continue to play either a masculine or a feminine role in their relationships no matter what their biological sex appears. Gender ideologies and social roles therefore play a large role no matter which sexuality they are involved with. The fact that biological sex does not affect one’s inherent gender ideology seems to support the idea of sexual fluidity as well. Rather than having a solidified sexuality, it is more plausible that one’s sex according to gender ideologies becomes the role that they would take in a relationship. Solidified biological sexuality serves only to limit the perceived types of relationships a person could be in rather than the role they take inside of all relationships. Ward already demonstrates how a man can be both hetero and homo sexual at the same time, yet take a dominating, masculine position in both roles (Ward 62). Having a solidified gender role appearance, people can really be any kind of “sexuality”. While sexuality can be fluid and difficult to define according to each person, Ward and Butler suggest the idea of sexual fluidity, where the way people act according to gender ideologies continues to be more or less the same no matter the sexual relations.