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Thursday, March 28
The Indiana Daily Student

Marginalized queer groups: an Inside perspective

Diana Ogrodowski – Asexual, she/her

Diana Ogrodowski never liked telling people about her crushes growing up because she said she felt they weren’t the same.

“If I did have crushes on people it was never because they were physically attractive,” she said. “I always liked them because they were really nice to me or because they were super friendly and cool.”

Ogrodowski is asexual. According to asexuality.org, an asexual is someone who doesn’t experience sexual attraction. It exists on a spectrum including demisexuals, gray-asexuals and gray-sexuals.

“I just don’t look at people and see them in any sort of sexual manner whatsoever at all and I never really have,” Ogrodowski said. “I surround myself with people because of who they are, not because of any sort of sexual attraction or anything about them physically. I never look at somebody and be like ‘Yeah, I would bang them.’ That’s just not something I’ve ever experienced in my life because it’s not an attraction that I have.”

Ogrodowski began identifying as asexual her junior year of high school. She said she was lucky to have several friends who also identified within the asexual spectrum. No one she’s come out to has ever reacted negatively, though some haven’t understood.

“I’m very fortunate for that because I know that a lot of times there is a lot of asexual violence, especially sexual violence — people like ‘You just haven’t had sex with me yet, I can fix you.’ And it’s not a matter of being fixed because you have to be broken to be fixed and it’s not something that is wrong with you.”

Ell Thomas – Polyamorous, they/them/they’re

It just didn’t make sense to them even as a child — being with only one person for the rest of your life.

“I was the 5-year-old asking ‘Why do the prince and princess only marry each other and not other people?’” said Ell Thomas, a polyamorous agender IU senior. “The concept of one true love or your special someone or your other half has always baffled me. Like one person? That’s ridiculous.”

Polyamory stems from the Greek word “poly” meaning “many” and the Latin word “amor” meaning “love.”

The idea of open relationships seemed normal to Thomas in high school. Though they weren’t dating anyone at the time, they remember thinking they would be OK with a partner seeing other people.

“Which made it difficult to date in high school,” Thomas said. “People were all very monogamously minded like ‘You can’t date multiple people — that’s cheating.’”

Thomas said that’s a common belief among those who don’t understand polyamory. But it’s not cheating because the partners know.

At the moment Thomas is engaged in two romantic relationships with various “high-level importance” relationships, three of which are in Bloomington. They have one primary partner out of state who they refer to as their main emotional support and they are comfortable this way.

“For me personally, I could never see myself settling down with just one partner,” Thomas said. “I think being limited to only one partner would be not just uncomfortable for me but detrimental to my mental health.”

Aimes Dobbins – Transmasculine non-binary, they/them/they’re

IU junior Aimes Dobbins dresses more in men’s clothing but they are not a boy. They also aren’t a girl.

Dobbins is a transmasculine non-binary individual.

“Transmasculine is on the transgender spectrum but it leans toward masculinity,” Dobbins said. “But it has nothing to do with gender because masculine and feminine are not related toward genders.”

It was a long journey for Dobbins to find an identity, and it’s a journey they’re still taking.

“I’ve always known something was really weird with me or different because going back to when I was in kindergarten I didn’t understand the difference between boys and girls,” Dobbins said. “My mom had to sit me down and explain that I couldn’t run around without a shirt on because I’m an AFAB individual — so assigned female at birth.”

Dobbins was raised as a girl but said they always felt there was something wrong about it “I knew that every time they said ‘she’ or something in the back of my brain bells would go off and I’d be like ‘this isn’t right’ but I didn’t know why and I didn’t have the words to describe it,” they said.

In middle school they thought they were bisexual. “I was like ‘well, if society tells me I’m a girl and I like girls then I might not be straight.”

Then as a freshman in high school they came out as a lesbian.

Sophomore year Dobbins cut their hair and came out as bi-gender. “When I came out as bi-gender I didn’t really understand what the word meant I just knew that I needed a word to describe myself,” they said.

Senior year they came out as a transgender man.

About a year ago, Dobbins began taking hormones. “That’s when I realized I was not a trans man because the thought of having a beard and being hairy was just not me.”

Dobbins has since stopped taking hormones and while identifying as non-binary for now, they don’t think they’re truly done finding their identity.

“I think gender is a construction in general like in society,” Dobbins said. “I’m not saying people choose to be trans because they don’t, but it’s who they are as a person. It’s something you can’t avoid. But I just realize that people are always changing."

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