Diversity Rules Magazine

April 2012 Abby and Ruthie: Thinking Out Loud An Interview With Abby Dees and Ruthie Alcaide By Jim Koury, Editor Abby Dees is a Los An- geles based civil rights attorney-turned-author, speaker, syndicated col- umnist and IMRU radio host. Abby wrote the book Queer Questions Straight Talk to help bridge the communication gap be- tween the LGBT and straight communities. For more information about Abby visit:queerquestio nsstraighttalk.com. You can also check out her new Facebook fan page for her column, which is Thinking Out Loud With Abby Dees. ,JRK: Can you each give Diversity Rules read- ers an idea of your backgrounds? AD: I always joke with people that I grew up in a suburban debutante cult! My mother hates it when I say that, but what I really mean is that my extended family is very old-style conser- vative WASP, and I grew up around a lot of privileged, country-club type people. But also during this time, mom was becoming very in- volved in Eastern philosophy, so she taught us to believe that every living thing is sacred and that we have a duty to try to be compassionate and humble even when you want to scream at someone for being an idiot (bless Santorum, he's a human being … Om, Om). She and I don't always agree on things, but when it comes to issues of respect and kindness, she's still a role model for me. RA: For a quick summary of my background, I grew up in a foster home starting when I was three, along with my triplet siblings and older sister. We had a very sheltered upbringing, so most of what I learned about Life in general happened in the classroom and various conver- sations with my peers. Growing up in Hawaii, in the 80s and early 90s, I wasn't exposed to the idea that there were any other sexual orien- tations other than "straight." So even the word "straight" wasn't even in my vocabulary. Look- ing back however, my internal ideas seemed to parallel an alternative mentality when I did notice an attraction to women. But as child go- ing into my teenage years, I interpreted this as "really liking someone" and not realizing at the Ruthie Alcaide has appeared on MTV's Real World Ha- waii, and The Challenge programs. She's now a college lecturer. You can find Ruthie via Twitter @RuthieAlcaide. Ruthie also has a Facebook fan page that you should go and "like." time that it was more of an attraction or crush. I knew I always wanted to be around this per- son, but I didn't know why, even though the feeling was more than magnetic. You get but- terflies, but it's another girl, you know what I mean? It wasn't until I was 16 and had my first experience with another woman that my life started to change. But it wasn't until I was 20 when I felt comfortable with my sexuality, comfortable enough to be free to be myself. In those few years of being closeted, I started to realize that this isn't the way I wanted to live. There were no role models that I could seek, let alone people I could speak to who could guide me into the open. To make a very long story short, I really wanted to spread the mes- sage that sexuality should not define you, your character should. My friends who are straight don't have to divulge that information, so why do I? I don't make a big deal out of it, and I believe that is why the people around me are so comfortable. That goes with a lot of factors in life, not just sexuality. We spend so much time defining our lives by labels and sexuality that we forget that what really matters and who we really are goes deeper than that. JRK: The two of you have collaborated on a couple of projects together. What was the first project that you collaborated on together? AD: She and I first started talking about our relationships with straight men and how much we both loved the straight guys – I call them "bro-friends" – in our lives. We certainly aren't unusual in this regard, so why does the idea that lesbians should actually like straight guys as friends surprise people? We thought it was time to let people into our conversation about it, and that became an article for The Good Men Project last year. RA: I collaborated with Abby on an article Four

• Cover