How To Be a Human: The Hetero Goggle Shuffle

So the other night, my girlfriend and I went to a party. At this party, we did normal party things. Chatting. Beer pong. Finding long-lost relatives. That sort of thing. We spent the second part of this party talking to these two dudes. They seemed relatively nice and smart and regular. Until they were LITERALLY being so SUPER WEIRD and PASSIVE AGGRESSIVELY HOMOPHOBIC at us for like AN HOUR. WTF. THE WORST.

So just in case you’re planning to interact with humans sometime in the future and you’re worried about how to not be totally WEIRD and AWKWARD and HOMOPHOBIC, lemme fill you in on something useful for your hetero lifestyle: don’t be WEIRD and AWKWARD and HOMOPHOBIC. You might think that you should be those things. But, actually, you shouldn’t. Not at anyone.

This party was full of people. But you kept talking to us, even after we told you we were together. Even after you made her clarify while I was in the bathroom that, yes, “together” means romantic monogamy with only each other. Yes, with each other, even though we are both femme ladies (MINDBOGGLING). Even after you stopped talking to our hetero-ly engaged friend. But you weren’t like, regular talking to us. You were doing the super weird combo of hitting-on and being-aggressive-at that I’ve unfortunately seen many times before. You were doing what I like to call the Hetero Goggle Shuffle. It didn’t matter what we said. She’s pretty and I don’t look like a man, so it didn’t fucking matter what words our mouths made. We were STILL TOTALLY POSSIBILITIES for HETEROSEXUAL SEX with YOU. Possibly not ideal options, but options nonetheless. But here’s the thing about that: Nope.

Here is the thing you should know. Here is the one thing. Okay, more than one thing. But here is the important thing: If you only want to talk to people who will have sex with you, then stop talking to us and go talk to a single (or poly or whatever) person who is expressing interest in having sex with you. In simple terms: if you only want get laid, stop talk to me. Use legs, walk other place. I don’t care if you do that. I am not offended. If all you want is sex, then go fucking find someone who wants to make sex with you. But that person is not me and it is certainly not my girlfriend. If you want to keep talking to me/us because we are cool and interesting and super awesome, then don’t be weird homophobic heteronormative asshats. Don’t hit on us, don’t be passive aggressive at us, don’t make awkward sex jokes where you pretend like you’re joking but you’re really demonstrating your uncomfortability with homostuff and making us feel super bad. Just don’t. If you want talk to us like human, TALK TO US LIKE HUMAN. Use brain, say regular words.

I just don’t get it. WHY ARE YOU STILL TALKING TO ME. I’m not going to have sex with you, and you’re being the worst. Honestly, I would almost rather that you said a homophobic slur, because then at least I could say “hey, bro, that’s extremely homophobic and you need to get some help to deal with whatever deep-seeded experiences with fear and anger have led you to this place in your life where you’re saying that stuff to strangers” and the whole room of allies would rise up and be allies. But instead, when you said to my gf “did you know what you’re doing is a sign of sexual frustration?” and then looked at me, if I’d been like “hey, bro, that’s a pretty fucked up comment because I’M RIGHT HERE, and I think you said that because of homophobia” then I’m the asshole committing a party-foul. Then all the allies would be like, “whoa, stop yelling about homophobia!” And I’d be like, “he started it!” And then everyone would be like, “…party-foul” and I would be the dick in this situation. But I wasn’t. In fact, it was my lack of dick in this situation that made it a situation at all.

Here is the moral of the story: take off your fucking Hetero Goggles. Take them off. Listen to my words, read my body language, and check your hetero privilege at the door. Just because your penis entered the room does not mean that all the single ladies and the femme ladies in committed monogamous relationships with other ladies (SAME THING, AMIRITE??) need to PUT THEIR HANDS UP. It doesn’t. And when someone tells you something about themselves, even something that contradicts the stereotypical box you’ve put them in, even if you can’t imagine that what they’ve said is true because you are so fucking alluring and how the fuck could that girl be with that other girl who also looks like she’s straight, LISTEN TO THEM and CHECK YOUR BEHAVIOR. Don’t do the shuffle and readjust your goggles until you forget what they’ve said and continue with Mission: Homoerasure. FUCKING LISTEN TO THEM and FUCKING CHECK YOUR BEHAVIOR.

Maybe try asking yourself this question: “Am I being WEIRD and AWKWARD and HOMOPHOBIC at this person?” If the answer is yes, use legs, walk away. Ain’t nobody got time for that.

How to Sell Bikes to Women

My roommate is a bike mechanic. She is also a lady. Apparently that is a big deal or something, which is surprising to me, since I thought that ladies could do things now[1].  Turns out, I was only medium correct – ladies can do some things now, but not too many things. And they need special treatment when doing things like buying bike-related products. This is something we need to LEARN ABOUT. FROM SEMINARS. WITH POWERPOINTS.

One such seminar on “HOW TO SELL BIKES TO WOMEN,” to be known simply as HTS-BTW forthwith, was the brainchild of a certain bike company that shall not be named (VOLDEMORT). I firmly believe the following facts from said REAL seminar are valid and essential enough to pass on to all of you:

--Women are referral machines. Finally someone is acknowledging the too-long unspoken truth that women are in fact not human beings! Once we accept this, we can really get over that whole sexism thing. Rather than continuing to treat women like people,[2] we should simply harness their machine-power for our own capitalistic good.

--Women like to shop, while men like to buy. Traits like these are carried in the X and Y chromosomes (SCIENCE!) and have nothing to do with our personal preferences, our childhood experiences with shopping (which are often influenced by our race and social class), our social conditioning, our financial situation, or the fact that many of us like to spend time deciding on expensive bike purchases.[3] Wow, SCIENCE!

--All women and men who enter a bike shop together are in a heterosexual romantic relationship and that is your business. You, the manly bike-shop worker,[4] should know about this, because boyfriends/husbands are domineering and girlfriends/wives are submissive. All of them! Never the other way around! Even though women make all the decisions (see below!) It’s sort of confusing! Try not to think about it too much! Be on alert!

--Every woman is in a heterosexual relationship with a man. She is going to make every decision in this relationship. This is true because of statistics! Women are the deciders for 51% of electronics! 60% of cars! 91% of vacations! What do those things have to do with bikes!?!

--Your shop is not a man cave! And don’t talk about the weather with your lady customers! This is a confusing one, ‘cause if you thought you were in a cave but now you’re NOT, the weather is a logical topic of conversation. But don’t do it, because that is WRONG. Ladies hate the weather. And caves.

--Women need time to think about things because it is hard for them to make up their little lady brains! It’s like, they can handle basic autonomic body functions and thinking about Ryan Gosling and Activia Yogurt^© at the same time, but when we throw something else in there, their lady brains short circuit. Then they can only think about buying expensive shoes until they can rest and reset in a comfortable place (the kitchen.) Amirite, ladies?

--You can (and should!) give a woman confidence! You, the manly bike-shop worker! Give her confidence! By doing all these things while selling her a bike! That is the only way she can get some…confidence! It won’t backfire even a little!

Wow, I don’t know about you, but by GOD I learned a lot from this presentation. Without it, I would have sold bikes to women IN THE COMPLETELY WRONG WAY. I would have done things like been friendly, listened, and treated them like valued and ungendered customers! I wouldn’t have known to infer about their sex lives or what color bike they might want (PINKWHITEBABYBLUE!!!!!!!) based on what I assumed was in their pants. HOW WRONG I WOULD HAVE BEEN. I would have been selling bikes, not selling bikes to women. That never would have worked.

Thank goodness we all know better now.

---

[1] Anchorman: The Legend of Ron Burgundy. Dir. Adam Mckay. Perf Will Ferrel, Christina Applegate, Steve Carell. Dreamworks, 2004. Film.

[2] I saw Battlestar Galactica, I know what happens when machines are treated with respect and then take control. It’s not good. It doesn’t end well, unless Will Smith and/or Captain Adama is on hand save us.*

*Nerdy ed note: Captain Janeway and President Roslin are not included in this list, because they too, like all women, are machines.

[3] Other traits carried by the X and Y chromosomes include: One’s willingness to ask/not ask for directions; how to immediately find the most expensive item in a store (X); one’s affinity for facts/numbers (Y); one’s affinity for stories (X); how to be a breadwinner (you know which chromosome that one comes on); tears (X).

[4] Yes, HTS-BTW believes that every single bike-shop employee is a man. Aside from gender being fluid, and also dumb, this means they just gave away their man-secrets to my lady roommate and her lady co-workers!!!! Who will now tell all their lady-friends the manly bike-shop workers’ secrets (see: referral machines!!)

This post is all due to the fantastic editing, rewriting, and hilarious additions of Diamond Racecar!!!