This little nugget buried in the article:
“I see it most when people want to win arguments — they pathologize themselves to give themselves authority (‘I have XYZ disorder therefore you must listen to me’ or ‘You are being XYZ horrible thing — racist, classist, narcissist, whatever — therefore you’re wrong’),” Moskowitz says. “The categorization allows for a flattening of nuance. You can’t argue with someone calling you a sexist or a sociopath or whatever, and you can’t argue with someone who bases the entirety of their argument in their personal experience.”
This instinct has only intensified over the past 18 months. Amanda Brennan, an internet trend expert at XX Artists, has observed the ways that, after sitting with themselves and reflecting during the isolation of the pandemic, many people have come to monumental realizations about their gender, sexuality, mental health, and identity. “It feels good to say, ‘Here’s a set of predetermined things that I can try on like a hat, and if it fits, it fits,” she says. “It’s like the closet scene in Clueless: You try it on and see how it feels.” (My favorite example of this: a TikTok that reads “when it was supposed to just be 2 weeks on Zoom but now you’re bisexual.”)
They turned the comments off too lol
“tHeYrE pAtHoLoGiZinG”
Damn maybe we live in a society that forces you to suppress entire parts of yourself to be accepted? And being separated from that society causes you to begin relaxing your defenses?
also, society expects you to fit nicely into a box, so when people have feelings not allowed within their box they immediately look for another box to go into so they can be accepted to some degree. people are "pathologizing" what might just be phases(I wish to make clear here, I am not saying any gender expression, sexuality, or identity in general is a phase, but simply am stating sometimes people go through occasional upsets to their regular identity that will go away, and they are not allowed to express that) so that they have a place within society. Even to be an exile or pariah, as mainstream culture delegates many queer folk, is more mentally comfortable than to have no assigned place in society.
deleted by creator
there is that yeah. But it's the whole sometimes someone is giving you attention and they're gay and you need attention so you feel want to reciprocate(here again I will clarify that gay people are not praying on straight people, but that a young teen or someone from a bad home might have trouble figuring out the exact nature of their feelings, and needs time and an open environment to sort themselves out), or you have strong feelings towards someone you look up to and mistake them for romance(as I can see how this may be misconstrued, this is by no means claiming gay relationships are based on a power imbalance or are in some way coercive, but that someone might have feelings that are not romantic but do not align with their usual friendships), or someone who is currently identifying as asexual could be a late bloomer(this is not to say all asexual people are just late bloomers or waiting for the right person, nor that younger people identifying as asexual should not be taken seriously), or in the case of gender, there is just so much going on I just thing the whole thing's a phase for everyone, I can't make heads or tails of it. In my personal experience, I felt I was transgender for a while. Then I felt cisgender again. I don't consider this a "phase" like being into pokemon, but more a particular period in my life and internal world. I've heard other people have similar things happen, so I imagine many people may go through phases like this and simply never entertain the thought fully that they may be a different gender than their assigned one. I see no reason this couldn't happen with sexuality as well. I will never call into question whether or not what someone declares as an identity is permanent or a phase, nor will I even think about the matter.