LGBTQ+ History Month: Giedrė Astrauskaitė

Content warning: description of institutionalised homophobia and homophobic laws

If you asked me what’s it like to have a homophobic home country while living in a more progressive, accepting place, I would think it would be something akin to time-travelling. Consider Ash’s dramatic speech about his first day as a teaching assistant and Clause 28 in 80s Britain from the show ‘It’s a Sin’:

‘We have to remove any books or material that might be promoting a homosexual lifestyle. <...> - Nothing. I found nothing. I checked Shakespeare, nothing. You might get versions on the stage that get a bit fruity with men in togas, but you need to ban the director not the book, 'cause in the whole of Shakespeare, there's not one man with a man, not one woman with a woman. <...> I looked at all the vast halls of literature and culture and science and art, and there is not the slightest danger of any child ever being infected, 'cause there's not one gay man or woman anywhere. There is nothing. That's what you're protecting them from. Nothing.’

80s Britain? I pause the episode and take a deep breath. A law, almost identical to that is in full force in Lithuania, my home country, today. 2022, baby! There cannot be a word about gay people mentioned in any non-negative light in Lithuanian schools. A music video with two men kissing (oh, the horror!) has to be shown past 11pm at night on TV. A fairytale book ‘Amber Heart’ with one story including lesbian princesses can only be sold with a parental advisory sticker ‘potentially harmful for anyone under 14 years of age’. In Lithuania, the children have to be protected, or so the law says.

My name is Giedrė Astrauskaitė, I’m 25, a physics PhD student and a graduate teaching assistant at the University of Glasgow. My story is that of an aspiring academic, immigrant and a young bisexual woman.

I left Lithuania and moved out of my conservative home when I was 19. When I had to fill out the UofG student registration, I was asked about my sexual orientation. I had never used a label like ‘bisexual’ to describe myself – I didn’t know that I could or that I was allowed to. Yet, when I was 13, I kissed my best friend and then of course I was terribly jealous when she was messaging boys and not me. We were just such good friends! When I was 15, I kissed another girl from my school. The list goes on. As a teenager, I did not have the language to identify these feelings. It was forbidden, unacceptable and unknown. All I heard about LGBTQ+ people back then was mostly hate speech and ridicule, in which I even took part in, myself. After starting to see LGBTQ+ issues in a more positive light, I still perceived them as something separate from me. Yet, I’m 19 years of age and it’s proving increasingly difficult to tick a box. I choose ‘bisexual’ and move on quickly. Far away from home, I claim the identity for the first time, yet, without fully internalising it.

The rest was a slow journey to self-acceptance and authenticity. It involved therapy, studying and reinterpreting my memories from teenage years. I started describing events and feelings with their true names. I started getting used to the idea that I could hold a woman’s hand on the street and other people are not judging me. I learned some vocabulary, too –‘heteronormativity’ and ‘compulsory heterosexuality’. I still get emotional when I hear other LGBTQ+ people, both students and university staff, talking about their partners openly. Or when I take the subway and see the Barnardo’s ad with two adoptive fathers.

Now when I say I am bisexual, I feel relief and belonging – the shame and disassociation has finally left me. I am so grateful to the academic community at the University of Glasgow; such an accepting and welcoming environment was one of the core pillars of support in the past years. When I sat my Electromagnetism 2 exam, the invigilator had a wee pride badge on her lanyard. My PhD supervisor even gifted me a pride badge (Hi Caroline, if you are reading this – thank you, immensely!). With my teaching and mentoring roles, I too remain committed to fostering inclusivity within the physics discipline and higher education as a whole.

But the increasing self-acceptance, as liberating as it was in Scotland, was equally suffocating when back in Lithuania. A 3-hour plane journey away, I take off my pride badge and pretend to live a different life. The border is so very present, in terms of time and space. Recently, the political climate and public discourse grew very challenging, too. The one openly gay MP was bullied with a state-wide petition to remove him. Same sex couples currently have no legal recognition in Lithuanian law. The proposed civil partnership bill including homosexual partners drew massive counter protests. When the parliament voted against it, I felt like I lost a home. I also felt like I should be there, fighting. Hearing the not-so-positive things my parents had to say about ‘those people’ (LGBTQ+ people), I decided that my first fight was to come out. I just had to come out. I went to therapy, trying to prepare for the worst. If somebody had asked me if I’d rather take 5 maths exams in a row or do that again, I’d go with the maths exams, go figure. But the power of coming out is vast (this comes with acknowledgement that being able to come out safely is a privilege). When I told my mother, she asked me when I knew. She thanked me for sharing that. And that was that. Perhaps LGBTQ+ people were no longer ‘those people’. This is still very recent and I don’t know how it will develop.

But now I think coming out is one of the most powerful things we can do to shatter the stigma in homophobic societies, communities and families. The gap between my home country and Glasgow, while still so stark, narrowed. Perhaps leading an authentic, joyous life and loving who we love is a form of activism on its own?

To my fellow LGBTQ+ people who look back to their homelands with longing, your happiness and authenticity is radical and precious. To those who are only learning the words to describe who they are, to those who are fighting the internalised homophobia, to those cannot come out and to those who can, to those who are terrified – I see you. Love wins and it’s only a question of time. That plane journey from Glasgow may feel like you’re in a time machine. But your bravery and excellence makes the clock tick faster. We have to hold on to each other, find love everywhere we can and celebrate our stories with pride. Our voices, resilience and presence -whether in academia or in any thing we do, that gives other young LGBTQ+ people the language and the power to understand their experiences in full. It also shows them that there is space for them, that queer joy is possible and attainable. This, more than anything slowly tears down the borders and walls of homophobia, wherever we choose to reside. We have always been here. We will always be here. With each day, more and more proud. And because of that, one day every young LGBTQ+ person, irrespective of where they were born, will have the right to experience their first silly teenage love fully present, fully aware, supported and proud.

‘We have one life and an amazing capacity to love and be loved. We must start by loving ourselves –that means accepting who we are completely. That’s the first part of coming out; the second is recognising that we must occupy our space in the world and not that loaned to us by being somebody else. Live. Love and be loved.’

- Michael Cashman

Written by:

Giedrė Astrauskaitė, GTA with LEADS