My name is Lindsay Walton and I am a recovered/recovering bigot.
In my third year, a friend of mine at Redeemer came out. It took a lot of courage for him to do so and the realization that I was one of the people he was afraid of living authentically in front of was not a happy moment for me. The idea of someone feeling afraid to share with me anything of deep importance to them, especially if they are feeling alone or afraid, is not acceptable to me.
It lead to an ongoing journey of realizing there were many more people in my life who were non-binary. And realizing the hurtful and foolish things I had said to those people that had lead to them hiding a foundational part of themselves from me because I hadn’t recognized my own ignorance and the unreasoned place from which I was speaking.
The cultural context I grew up in used the concept of being ‘gay’ as an insult. Being ‘gay’ was spoken of in tones that suggested the subject was shameful, not something to be discussed in polite company. Individuals who were gay, lesbian, or transvestites (these were the only terms I heard until my mid 20’s, the idea that other gender identities could exist was a totally foreign concept) were spoken of as though they had made the very conscious choice to live this way and as a result would experience all the negative outcomes associated with that ‘lifestyle’. They were more prone to being promiscuous and likely had diseases. Being in close proximity was not only a risk to my physical health (you might get AIDS!), but you might become gay yourself.
I am ashamed and embarrassed to say that as a teen I thought I understood enough from my school health classes and church to be able to be a force for Good in my world. My teachers weren’t comfortable discussing gender identities so for those classes we watched episodes of Degrassi High. Church leaders did not discuss sex, but definitely taught us how to evangelize our gay friends and not get pulled down that path of sin. The cumulative effect was that I had been equipped with trite lines and just enough incorrect and incomplete information to weaponize me and point me at my friends and family so I could win them over for Christ (I am cringing in horror as I write this).
One morning in high school my teacher announced we would be having a debate. I recognize this teacher now as one of those phenomenal human beings who knows the bounds of their office and the reason they became a teacher in the first place and somehow finds the delicate balance between these things to help students find their voices. Two girls, who were either non-binary themselves or allies (I don’t know because it never occurred to me to care to find out, I only saw ‘the opposition’) would be taking the side supportive of homosexuality and the rest of the class would be taking a position of challenge to that stance. While the debate was not something the rest of the class had known would happen, the girls were prepared and the teacher placed himself in a position that indicated he was there not only to moderate the debate but was also supporting the two young women who were feeling very nervous while trying to do something obviously very important to them.
I was chomping at the bit. I knew how to win this. To win! What an incredibly disgusting attitude I have no belief in now as an adult. There is no winning a conversation. If you enter a conversation as a competition you’ve already lost. People exist to be engaged with, to learn from, to be sharpened by. I didn’t get that at the time and had my hand raised ready for my turn. A few minutes into the debate I got it. “If people are meant to be gay then why can we only reproduce by putting a man and a woman together”?
The girls froze. They had no answer. They looked to the teacher. He looked back to them to reassure them they weren’t alone and then said I had asked a fair question, did the girls have anything they would like to say in response? They couldn’t think of a response and so the debate came to an end. I had won, and by that I realize now I had failed miserably. The weapon I had used to shut down that conversation was exactly that, a weapon, a conversation ender. I had been taught how to ask questions that couldn’t be answered. What about that, huh? You have no answer so you must be wrong! You should give your life to Jesus.
It has taken me decades to work through the layers, to reason through my thinking and responses and their roots. I still have to remember to forgive myself for how I responded to my friend in high school who came out to me and I had no idea what to do. She was one of the most phenomenal people I knew, I loved her to bits, and when she told me she was gay I sat across from her a disconnected and confused blank who was primarily aware of my fear that maybe she was going to say she had a crush on me and with a smaller voice in the back of my head loving my friend so much and having no idea what to say or do because I hadn’t been prepared for this. I knew how to combat homosexuality and win over ‘gay people’ for Christ. This was my friend who was sitting with her feet curled up under her on the chair, feeling incredibly vulnerable and trusting me with something so important to her. She was human and a valuable person to me and I hadn’t been equipped to put homosexuality and a person I loved together in the same place. I failed her. Wherever she is now, I hope that amazing things have happened for her, that she is surrounded by love, that she is whole and has confidence about who she is and has peace. She deserves nothing less and if opportunity presents I hope to be able to tell her how phenomenal I thought she was then and to say I’m sorry.
I was failing other people in my life, left, right, and center still having so self-awareness of my bigotry, this time in the realm of virginity. At school we learned that if you have sex you can get pregnant. Don’t get pregnant. If you get pregnant it will be nine months long and you’ll throw up because you’ll have morning sickness. More Degrassi High episodes about Spike helped to fill in for the conversations the teachers were too uncomfortable to have. From church I knew that “sex was for marriage”, end of story. French kissing someone was like falling down the stairs, you don’t mean to trip but then you have momentum and find yourself falling all the way down. Men are like microwaves and women are like ovens.
I found out later that people I cared about who had sex and were feeling conflicted about it didn’t consider me a safe person to talk with to process. Missing out on supporting them also meant missing the opportunity to learn from other people’s life stories which we benefit from in every corner of life. A girl I knew from youth group got pregnant. I just let that connection slide and didn’t do anything to celebrate her new baby. She had made a ‘lifestyle’ choice and to ‘release’ people from your life who were on a path of sin was a ‘natural consequence of their choices’. By judging and distancing myself from her I missed out on being able to provide babysitting so she could rest and celebrate her beautiful baby boy with her which would have also taught me more about pregnancy, being a mother, and caring for a newborn. When I started university I did a seasonal stint as a cashier at a small retail outlet and crossed paths with someone I went to school with all the way from kindergarten until… when did I see her last? It was then I learned she had a little girl, old enough that she would have had her in our grade 11 or 12 year. I didn’t notice she was gone even though she had always been a part of the picture for me going to school because she did what every unmarried pregnant student did, inconspicuously disappear. Even when I was face-to-face with her again, the knowledge she’d had a baby outside of marriage was enough to make me pull back. I didn’t really reconnect with her when I had the chance. And as a result, I missed out again on being able to offer babysitting and to learn about life with a pre-schooler.
I was fed misinformation by other misinformed people in positions of authority, had information held back, had other people’s thoughts and interpretations of the bible presented to me as TRUTH, and was equipped to shut people down and to walk away from ‘sinners’. I missed out on so many opportunities to love and care for people I would go back now and step up for if I could. I missed out on so many learning opportunities because I judged and walked away from uncomfortable situations that didn’t reflect my understanding of the RIGHT way to live. NONE of this equipped me properly for my own experiences of being married or having children. Marriage, pregnancy, and childbirth included amazing wonder and were a total overwhelm navigating the learning curve of filling in the canyons of my missing knowledge. The first time around, my lack of knowledge about childbirth almost cost me my life.
Even coming to a realization that I was hurting people and regurgitating ignorance didn’t mean I could magically overcome it. Learning takes time and I am sorry to say that I continued to hurt a lot of people along the way. I am particularly grateful for the non-binary people in my life who have had patience with me and helped me to question my assumptions, actions, and language. I’m on a continuing journey and one that I am grateful for because when I began to engage with my beliefs and reason through where they came from, their outcomes, who I wanted to be, and how I wanted to behave moving forward some amazing transformations began to happen.
I share my story because I know what it felt like to realize maybe I was not Right and that maybe I didn’t have the Answers and that I needed to start asking more questions and learn to say “I don’t know” a lot more often. I know what it felt like to think bigots were unintelligent people who foamed at the mouth with indignation and spewed hateful slurs only to realize instead that I could be intelligent, a nice person, have a big heart, and love a lot of people and still be a bigot as the result of not having questioned what I believed and reasoned through it to better understand my biases and areas for growth. That in-between transition time of revelation, questioning, and feeling out a new way of doing things is unsettling and I want to tell as many people as possible that leaning into that process is so incredibly worth it.
I also share my story because I want anyone who has ever been judged, walked away from, or pushed to the shadows because you aren’t a virgin, because you had a baby without a ring on your finger, or because you are non-binary to hopefully find some encouragement in knowing that people like me can change.
I am on a journey of being comfortable with being uncomfortable, of consistently learning and having to adjust my previous understanding based on that new knowledge. Having the Answers felt good. Having Questions feels so much better. And it’s not just about feeling more alive and at peace and better connected with the people around me and with God. From a faith perspective, I was turning people away from God and didn’t even realize it. Recovering from bigotry has made it possible for me to come alongside so many people on their life and faith journeys and keep them company, a mutually beneficial process, which I would not have been able to do before.
I hope that by sharing my story others may have the opportunity to self-reflect and travel on their own journeys of recovery from bigotry. <3
Wishing you all the best,
Lindsay Walton
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