Being Openly Gay | US vs The Netherlands | American in the Netherlands

hi everyone i'm ava i'm an american living here in the netherlands and today i wanted to talk to you about being gay both in the u.s and in the netherlands now a few weeks ago i did a q a video and i asked you all for questions for the q a video and i was surprised to find that many of you wanted to know what it was like being gay in the netherlands compared to what it was like being openly gay back in the us where i grew up now this is a little bit of a tough video for me to make personally but i thought the way i could approach it is to share my experience with you throughout the last 10 plus years that i've been openly gay and let you see for yourself what that has been like for me in order to do that i need to share my coming out story with you well i don't need to share it but i'm going to share it anyways in order to talk about my experiences today i feel like i need to backtrack a little bit to when i first came out and give you a bit of context to what that has been like for me up to this point so i came out when i was 17 and i came up multiple times and i still continue to come out to this day but the first time the first big realization that i may be attracted to women was for me when i was 17. this was back in 2010 and let me tell you 2010 in the us was a completely different time to be gay than now a lot has changed in 10 years believe me i feel like for many people knowing that they are gay or suspecting that they may be even just attracted to members of the same sex might be a gradual thing for me it was more of like a smack in the face like one morning i woke up in college and it was like good morning ava you might be gay it was really that fast and that abrupt and you would think coming out only 10 years ago you know in the grand scheme of things maybe 10 years isn't a long time so you would think maybe ava came out about 10 years ago in new york city in college how bad could it have been and it wasn't that bad i didn't receive a lot of hate i did receive some hate a little bit of discrimination but mostly people were supportive or at least tried to be supportive so my friends tried to be supportive but they also thought they were supporting me by saying things like ava you don't really look gay so are you sure you're gay are you sure you aren't just bisexual or are you sure you're not just bi-curious i even had some of my friends who i would consider pretty liberal at the time tell me that because my family wouldn't be accepting of me being gay that i should perhaps still continue dating men and seeing what that is like yes people actually told me that i should continue to date and eventually marry a man just because it would be easier for me this was 2010 not that long ago in the u.s and let me remind you new york city new york is pretty liberal so it is really surprising for me to sometimes think back to that time and then tell people that it was very different back then and i sound so old when i say that i am 28 years old it should not make that particular difference whether i was 17 or 18 or 28 but there you have it so basically at the time all of these comments kind of contributed to me being very confused and led me to cut my hair a little shorter and joining rugby and that was working out for me no shocker there so then i decided hey maybe i should take my friend's advice and continue dating men and kind of play that part of a heterosexual person because people kept telling me i didn't look gay enough to be gay so that was pretty confusing and like i said 10 years ago it shouldn't have been that different than it is today so i spent a couple of years being confused until i was about 20 when i finally decided that this none of this none of it at all was working for me and i was like you know i am who i am i'm just going to fully embrace it and i know there's a lot to unwind and i just need to start now in order to embrace and live the life that i want to live and at the time this was i said it was around 20 so it was around 20 2013 in the us when the political climate and also just the general vibe around gayness was changing so it went from being tolerated to being accepted and it was all the rage to like support lgbtq people and be an lgbtq ally and i also noticed the same friends who have always tried to be supportive but i found their support to actually be helpful after those short three years so their comments went from you know commenting on how my hair was long therefore i couldn't possibly be gay to actually helping me be who i was and saying things like it's 2013. people need to get with the times and if your family isn't accepting then that's their problem so i really saw the shift in mentality and mindset my early 20s in the us was definitely the period where i felt that the times were changing and i also saw that changing because it was only in 2015 in the us when gay marriage was legalized across the country that is incredible to think of that it was just a little over five years ago that same-sex marriage was legalized in the u.s like five years is nothing it's barely enough time for all the gay people who got married five years ago to get divorced already so my experiences in the us around that time were really varied because as i said a lot has changed recently in the us like i went from being completely uncomfortable with who i was and telling people about my feelings and my identity my super secret identity just kidding i was always pretty open about it and at some point i felt so comfortable with the change the positive change that was happening that i would walk into parties with people i didn't know and introduce myself as a lesbian and then say oh my name is ava by the way yeah i was that person but can you really blame me and now fast forward to five years ago when i met my girlfriend who was dutch and that was when i could really see what it was like to be in a same-sex relationship and also to be openly gay in the streets and in conversations in the us and in the netherlands because i think up to that point i had dated several people but there was nothing serious and when you're in a relationship i think you see things from a completely different perspective because here's the thing before i was in this long-term relationship with another woman i think people would just assume that i was straight so in conversations i couldn't say things like my girlfriend and then people would assume i was straight because i look straight like i don't even know what that's supposed to mean like what does it mean when you say that you have long hair and therefore don't look gay enough like i've never really understood that so of course i only got to experience the whole us versus netherlands comparison after i started dating my partner and before then things were actually quite weird like i would tell people that i was interested in dating women and that i was gay and i would get the craziest responses like maybe you just haven't met the right guy yet and oftentimes it was men who would say that so then i would look at them and go maybe you haven't met the right guy yet i know pretty sassy but it's just so tiring to go through this over and over again and all because i think for me a large part of my experiences also has to do with the fact that when people look at me they don't immediately see me as someone who likes women again i don't really know what that means anyway so now that i'm dating my girlfriend i can tell you about the differences that i've really noticed in a relationship and being openly gay in the u.s and in the netherlands and there are some differences that i was surprised to see so the netherlands is more progressive when it comes to same-sex marriages and the same-sex relationships in general one great example is remember how i said that in the u.s same-sex marriage was legalized in 2015 across the country while in the netherlands that happened in 2001. the netherlands was in fact the first country to legalize same-sex marriage how amazing is that and i feel like this carries over into other parts of life where i feel like being gay and being in a gay relationship is more normal in the netherlands like i don't feel like i'm standing out too much if i'm gay in the netherlands than compared to in the us but let me give you one example so in the u.s even if we were in the most progressive of cities within the country when my girlfriend and i would walk hand in hand on the streets we would get a ton of comments a ton of comments like seriously and the comments range from negative to positive and one of the instances that i remember so vividly was when we had first started dating and we went on a week-long trip to seattle now seattle was known as this like gay hub in the u.s like really seriously i thought it was going to be a great experience for both of us so we go to seattle and we're just walking hand in hand on the streets like all day also we're just newly dating so it felt very natural to do that and we weren't even in the mindset where we were really thinking about whether this is something we wanted to do in public or not we were just so excited to be together that we were holding hands and i was just surprised that the number of times people had something to say about that how is that supposed to make you feel normal well it didn't and i'm not saying that the comments were all necessarily negative like some of the comments were neutral like a dude shouting at us like i'm a lesbian too i don't think he knew what the word lesbian meant but so those type of comments or even more positive comments like go you girls like i support this and all that is fine and especially if it's a positive comment it puts a smile on our faces but if that happens over and over again you you see that people feel the need to say something either to show that they're they stand with you or against you or it's just the fact that you stand out is is not something that makes you feel like you belong in contrast in the netherlands we have not had that experience and especially around the same time when we had first started dating and it was our first time in amsterdam together we remember this moment vividly when we were standing at a you know crowded cross street an intersection where we were both trying to cross the street onto one side and we saw this guy coming right at us from the other side and he was staring at us hardcore which made us both immensely uncomfortable and it was crowded so we didn't we weren't quite sure what was going to happen now as the crowd thinned down we saw that this guy who had been aggressively staring at us and we almost felt sure he was gonna say something or maybe just give us a look but it turns out he was actually holding hands with another man himself so how great is that he was probably just looking at us as a sign of recognition and it's very different when you're talking about this kind of recognition as opposed to people who look at you because you stand out i think this is a great example to show the contrast around the same time it was that same summer when we were in seattle and got all those negative comments and the same summer when we were in amsterdam and it was all wonderful and that has continued to be my experience here i really feel like i me and my girlfriend as a couple together we really don't stand out people don't stare at us as much now that said it of course isn't the case that being gay in the netherlands is just the same as if if i were a heterosexual person or in a heterosexual relationship they are still for instance neighborhoods where i don't feel quite comfortable holding hands with my girlfriend and walking around also here in the netherlands even though i think for the most part it would be fine in the us i would say they are way more neighborhoods where i feel more uncomfortable holding hands with another woman and walking around so in that way it's still true that the netherlands is it feels more of a safe place for me to be out and to be gay whereas in the us i think i always thought about it more whereas here i kind of sometimes forget that i'm gay that definitely did not happen in the u.s in the u.s i was more cognizant of it and i would always think about all right are we walking here what time of day it is and how i felt about it so i was always aware whereas here i forget it and let loose now i don't know this is true and i don't have any numbers to show support or refute my point either way but what i feel personally is that in the u.s one of the things that you often hear on the news or you hear a lot about is lgbtq teens homelessness high suicide rates um all violence against lgbtq people whereas here in the netherlands i think that still exists and i think that may or may not apply to other subgroups of the lgbtq umbrella more than the gay subgroups but i feel like if you're gay in the netherlands it's more accepted and there's still some violence and discrimination against gay people but i think that's my impression has been that that's less than what i see or what i've experienced and felt in my surroundings in the us let me know what you think about that or if you have anything to say to that point because i don't know of course and just because things aren't reported here in the netherlands maybe it doesn't mean that it doesn't happen the thing that is absolutely 100 still the same both in the us and in the netherlands is that you never stop coming out because we live in a heteronormative society and that sounds quite heavy but it could be something small where let's say i'm at a party and i tell someone i'm in the netherlands because my partner is dutch and they might immediately ask without thinking about it oh where did you meet him and in that moment i'm really i'm in a little bit of a shock because i didn't expect them to assume that i was with a guy because you know i'm gay i don't know any better for myself like to me it's really i feel like that's the norm so i don't think about it so when someone says that it catches me off guard and it's a bit uncomfortable to have to tell that person no wait actually i'm with a woman because that might make the other person feel uncomfortable because maybe they're all supportive of lgbtq people and they just also live in this heteronormative society and therefore they just automatically made that assumption so it's like coming out in these little moments continues to be hard no matter where you are and i i think it's this interesting fact that even if your surroundings are quite supportive because you're in a minority group it's just always something you need to do you're not going to be the standard you're not going to be the norm you're not going to be the majority so there's always something you would need to do in order to make up for that or there's always a little bit of assumption or discrimination stereotyping hello that's still a thing so yeah that continues to be hard i mean this whole coming out over and over again thing may not seem like a big deal if you are not queer but let me tell you it is like at some point you just want to be like it i give up i just want to wear a t-shirt that says i am gay af and call it a day now i want to end on a positive note and give a shout out to my dutch extender family so my dutch in-laws thank you so much for being so supportive my girlfriend's parents and the people they're married to and their partners everyone in her whole family has been so supportive of our relationship and i cannot be more grateful especially because my parents they're not american-american they've just moved to the us they're more indian than american and they are not accepting of our relationship and they are extreme they're not supportive as of this moment where i'm filming this video they are not supportive of my life choices i mean it's not a choice but even if it was a choice i think being gay is a pretty nice thing anyway that's besides the point but i wanted to just give a huge shout out and thanks to my dutch family i feel so accepted that i don't stop to think about us being in a gay relationship so thank you for that and yeah that's very touching i don't know and i don't think that that speaks to all dutch people but it is just really nice to see her really her whole family be so accepting of it her 90 year old grandma was also accepting of our relationship i mean that was really something to see anyway so those are my experiences being gay in the us growing up and here in the netherlands as well if you have anything to add to this please let me know in the comments below i would love to hear from you as always you

Channel: Dutch Americano

Views: 156,888

Keywords: Gay in the Netherlands, Gay in America, Dutch culture, American culture, life in the Netherlands, expat in the Netherlands, American in the Netherlands, lgbt, lgbtq, coming out story, story time, coming out in America, gay in the US

Id: qe3lN1yexO4

Length: 16min 26sec (986 seconds)

Published: Sun Jan 10 2021