Joaquin Najera

So here I am presenting myself. I am scared but happier than I’ve ever been. I can finally be myself. I am a trans woman.

I remember smiling a lot, not necessarily because of the hookup, but because I was proud that I was allowing myself to finally live and to experience simple pleasures instead of being stuck in constant rigidity.

In the future, I don’t want to be someone’s experiment. But this is not to say that I discourage people to experiment with queerness; rather, I think it’s necessary to explore one’s sexuality and I encourage more people to learn about themselves.

Even if we wore the same color, the nail polish would always look different on me. I would always be the “unacceptable” gay, and he would be the “acceptable” gay.

If you have been keeping up with my column until now, you have probably realized that I don’t have very much sex (which is, to say the least, ironic considering I write this column).

Not all queer media needs to have sex scenes, but whether or not the characters have sex, I want that decision to be made with me and other queer people in mind.

Body image issues run rampant in queer men because, unlike their straight male counterparts, queer men experience the male gaze with a new level of intensity — they are both the subjects and the observers.

While perhaps not homophobes, straight men feel an inclination to portray queer men in a sexual or feminine context as a joke in order to distance themselves from queerness.

After regaining our strength, we slowly got up and put on our clothes. While my hookup had shown no interest in talking to me before having sex, he seemed more open to chatting after.

I came to the conclusion that men don’t prioritize the sexual pleasure of their partners, but rather, their focus is largely centered on their own sexual gratification.