I feel most people’s sexuality is enormously complicated. That’s what it means to be human. Wouldn’t it be great if we honored that complexity rather than turn it into gossip or ridicule? Wouldn’t it be great if we accepted sexual diversity, in ourselves and others, without condemning it?
Interpretation
Human sexuality is complex and should be honored rather than judged or ridiculed.
Janet Jackson's quote emphasizes the intricate nature of human sexuality and calls for a respectful acceptance of sexual diversity. She advocates for understanding and honoring this complexity in ourselves and others instead of reducing it to gossip or judgment, promoting a more inclusive and compassionate societal perspective on sexual identity.
In practice
In a discussion about LGBTQ+ rights during a seminar on inclusivity.
People tend to put entertainers on pedestals. We're human beings, just like you. You may see us smiling, and whether we have money or not, we still have bills to pay, we still have our stresses. I think a lot of people want to focus on others' shortcomings to make themselves feel better. And it's a very sad thing.
I've never been one for keeping a journal, so my songs were my journals. They allowed me to express my feelings and let people know what was going on with me. I knew that somebody would relate.
I'm convinced that we Black women possess a special indestructible strength that allows us to not only get down, but to get up, to get through, and to get over.
Some of my battles with weight have been very public. But most of them have been internal. Even at my thinnest, when my body was being praised, I wasn't happy with what I saw in the mirror or how I felt about myself.
Finally, I decided that the proper strategy was to stare back. Boys do not have a monopoly on the Staring Business, after all. So I looked him over and soon it was a staring contest. After a while the boy smiled, and then finally his blue eyes glanced away. When he looked back at me, I flicked my eyebrows up to say, I win. He shrugged
I'm a failure as a woman. My men expect so much of me, because of the image they've made of me and that I've made of myself, as a sex symbol. Men expect so much, and I can't live up to it.
I've always had this feeling wherever I go. Of not feeling fully part of things, not fully accepted, not fully inside of something.
We do right enough darling, if we go wrong together.
The girl was grateful to the young man for every bit of flattery; she wanted to linger for a moment in its warmth and so she said, 'You're very good at lying.' 'Do I look like a liar?' 'You look like you enjoy lying to women,' said the girl, and into her words there crept unawares a touch of the old anxiety, because she really did believe that her young man enjoyed lying to women.
Being 'out and proud' can feel like a real luxury of Western culture, where people are often white and see existing white gay people in their culture. That's a kind of privilege people don't know they possess.
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