Lying To Be Me

So I admit it. I’m a lying lesbian. And who can blame me? I’m sure my church would condemn my lies. I’m sure my mother would be most disappointed in me. I’m sure my father would cry if he knew the lies I tell.

Ever since we are young we are told that honesty is the best policy, and that lying is wrong. Yet like Santa and the Easter Bunny, this myth eventually fades, and we are left with the truth that to lie isn’t that bad, as long as you aren’t a bad liar.

As a child I had a sad affliction, every time I told a lie, no matter how little, white or outrageous, I would go bright red. My family and friends still look back at my flushes with amusement. They assume that this incessant blushing is still the case.

Perhaps “liar” and “closeted lesbian who still wants some kind of social life” fall into the same bracket. Even if this is not the case, I cannot pretend that I haven’t become a much more accomplished fibber since I accepted my sexuality. Over the past years I have found myself choosing not to divulge (or rather lie about) the lesbian youth web forums I visit, the lesbian friends I have and my exact whereabouts on the day of the Gay Pride Parade. Even the very books I read are by ‘feminist authors’, not ‘lesbian authors’.

“I don't think homosexuality is a choice. Society forces you to think
it's a choice, but in fact, it's in one's nature. The choice is whether one
expresses one's nature truthfully or spends the rest of one's life lying about
it.”
Marlo Thomas

So – now you are either disgusted, empathetic, or are wondering just what my problem with telling the truth is. Time to smash down another wall of conception from my youth. I’ve learned that lying is easier. Lying means I don’t have to come out to a family of high religious (or at least conservative) belief, I don’t have to justify my interest in lesbian youth forums and gay pride parades, and lying means I don’t have to be the me it wouldn’t be comfortable to be to those who I know, or at least presume wouldn’t understand.

I’m not a compulsive liar at any stretch of the matter in hand. I lie as a defensive measure, to protect myself. Surely you cannot begrudge me the right to defence?

Fume at me if you believe it’s immoral to be me to myself alone.

Call me despicable if I care too much for fragile, fabricated illusions.

But remember, I’m not the only liar.