Closeted Teens: Dissociated Adolescents

Just like all teens, LGB youth dive into the dating lifestyle at some point. In a society filled with homophobia and biphobia, dating can be an especially complicated endeavor for members of the LGB community. Unfortunately, they have struggled with more disadvantages compared to heterosexual adolescents. LGB youth have a harder time creating relationships which means those who want to experience relationships cannot freely do so. They are closeted, discriminated and live a heterosexual life. These are examples of the struggles they face in our society.

Firstly, most LGB youth are closeted. One of the biggest struggle LGB teens face is the concept of freely dating. “Closeted individuals frequently cannot acknowledge to themselves, let alone

Their homosexuality is so unacceptable that it must be kept out of conscious awareness and cannot be integrated into their public persona. Consequently, these feelings must be dissociated from the self and hidden from others.” (Drescher, 2004). This means they have difficulty openly showcasing their relationship to the public. Sadly, they do not always behave like themselves and tend to put up a façade. As such, they do not honestly express their desires which causes a stunt in their dating life. These closeted individuals might start to separate their attractions and feelings for the people of the same sex from their identity. They keep their desires out of their conscious awareness to separate their sexual identity from the rest of their persona since they find their desires unacceptable. This leads them to live a double life that they are unaware of. Furthermore, while many young people who

Since they are often discriminated, LGB teens have been quarantined out of many social groups. Peer harassment is also some sort of impediment for the dating life of LGB folks. “Adolescents can be very cruel to others who are different, who do not conform to the expectations of the peer group” (Price, 1982, 472). This would reflect the fear of admitting who they are because they do not want to be associated with the negative messages about homosexuality and the majority of LGB young people will have internalized a stigmatized identity. To avoid harassment, they would often seek opposite-sex friendships over same-sex friendships to avoid giving away their sexual orientation. Not only that, but they can also be excluded by the rest of society once they are out, thus they have difficulty interacting with other people and making new bonds. The fact that young LGB youth are discriminated by their own family, they choose to be enclosed or to be excluded from the rest of society causing them to build or to create less relationships between them and the other people. Another problem would have to be the struggle of inequality. They are often oppressed for being what is considered “unnatural” to many. Any form of discriminations can negatively impact the youth of the LGB