August 2, 2013

  • "Maybe you just haven't met the right guy/girl" really isn't all that offensive of a statement.

    After all – by all technicality –, this could very well be true. Given all the millions upon millions of people in the world, perhaps you just haven't met the right one to change your mind or the one who might be the exception. I've more than a handful of friends for whom that's been the case.

    No, the phrase itself is not offensive. It's the repetition.

    While only the truly non-homophobic may react with calm, mom may simply react with surprise upon the first suggestion that what she might really enjoy is the disregard for stopping within the first half-hour and the attention to female pleasure in a lesbian orgy. And dad may be confused when you first note that nothing would be more of a flexing of masculinity than a sausage fest with the guys. But, eh, kids say the darndest things.

    But that's just the start; soon you're responding to every time mom mentions that one of the girls in the movie you're watching is so pretty with, "So, you've been considering the option." Or when dad complains about not being able to watch football in peace, you mention – with a smirk – that there's always an alternative.

    And maybe there is. Maybe it would work. But maybe dad and mom are happy, in spite of the differences with each other. Or, if your parents are separated, maybe mom and dad are fairly certain that they don't have much interest in the same sex. Or maybe, after a lifetime of dating the opposite sex, they don't want to put such a gigantic effort into simply trying to see if something could work there or if they might happen to find that very small exception out of the mass of people in this world. Or maybe they just want the choice to say, "No, I don't want to and so I won't because I can make decisions about my own life as a free and autonomous person," (note: a verbatim sentence either of your parents might actually say).

    Or any other myriad of reasons. And so they're a little irritated by the 200th time you mention at Thanksgiving dinner in front of grandma that maybe they just haven't found the right guy or gal yet. And, in spite of having little interest in changing what they've always done, they really shouldn't give up so easily on this task.

    After all, how the Hell should they know if they've never even been with a girl or guy?