Matt Joseph Diaz

There’s almost definitely a better way to begin this, but I can’t think of one more appropriate. Growing up is really fucking weird. One day you’re having a great time arguing if Doctor Doom would beat Darth Vader in a fight (he would,) and next thing you know you’re worrying about taxes and whatever a “mortgage” is.

Instead of being allowed to exist as fully complex and sexual human beings, they’re relegated to being a tag in pornography. They’re seen as a guilty pleasure among those with “abnormal” sexual appetites, something to be viewed sexually in spite of their comparison to what we consider "the norm."

I am so very afraid.

I know, it's Monday. BLECH. But, that also means it's time for #MondaysWithMatt.

Representation is one of those persistent issues that will always be argued about. However for people of color, queer people, and those who live outside the gender binary, it’s an issue that ties into our identities as a whole.

Of course, summertime also seems to come hand-in-hand with partial nudity. Wearing next to nothing out in public is just as important a part of summer as barbecues and trips to the beach. That is, unless you’re anything outside the socially acceptable body types. Then it suddenly becomes an opportunity for people to dole out their own specific kind of “fashion justice.”

Once I became a body positive writer and speaker, I told the story of that night on podcasts and in interviews as an example of the sort of reaction I was afraid of prior to my video about my excess skin going viral. Every time, the interviewer made a comment about how Dana was “the ugly one,” not me. And every time, I told them I didn’t want her to be vilified or insulted.

From a young age, people (especially women) are constantly taught that we’re in competition with one another. Whether it’s our grades, our social status, our economic status, or those creepy beauty pageants for 6 year olds, we’re immediately thrust into a world where we’re taught to view everyone as adversarial to a certain degree.

I know that the world can seem like a scary and terrible place, where it feels like the threat of judgment and exclusion is constantly looming. That’s because it is; but there’s so much more love and kindness on this planet than evil and suffering. There is generosity and spirit in every human being that runs so deep, you’ll find it hard not to fall a little bit in love with each and every one of them.

If I get into a heterosexual relationship and spend the rest of my life with that person, I will still be bisexual. I will still feel that attraction to the man on the other side of the bar, even if I’m in love with my partner who happens to be a woman.