I had only been allowed on the reassurances that it was ‘just a phase’. My dad had found out I was gay and had threatened to not let me go. I escaped that household when I got to university, but barely. ‘You don’t think you’re a woman, do you?’ he once growled in horror. My dad made clear that the only thing worse than being gay was being trans. When I reached my teens, I was torn in conflict between being gay and my Muslim upbringing.
I barely accepted myself as a gay man, never mind trans people. Who did the cleaning, who earned money and who looked after children. My dad had overbearing rules about men and women, and what was acceptable and what wasn’t. I don’t think I had particularly enlightened views as a teenager either. I didn’t know then I was gay, that came later.
Too many LGBTQ+ people are raised to hate ourselves before we know ourselves – particularly in conservative homes.Īs a seven-year-old child, I recall watching some kind of daytime chat show where gay relationships were being furiously debated.Ī man stood up and bellowed: ‘It’s Adam and Eve, not Adam and Steve’.
