Oral History Program Brittny Paz Interviewed by Ky Jackson 11 August 2022 Oral History Program Weber State University Stewart Library Ogden, Utah Brittny Paz Interviewed by Ky Jackson 11 August 2022 Copyright © 2023 by Weber State University, Stewart Library Mission Statement The Oral History Program of the Stewart Library was created to preserve the institutional history of Weber State University and the Davis, Ogden and Weber County communities. By conducting carefully researched, recorded, and transcribed interviews, the Oral History Program creates archival oral histories intended for the widest possible use. Interviews are conducted with the goal of eliciting from each participant a full and accurate account of events. The interviews are transcribed, edited for accuracy and clarity, and reviewed by the interviewees (as available), who are encouraged to augment or correct their spoken words. The reviewed and corrected transcripts are indexed, printed, and bound with photographs and illustrative materials as available. The working files, original recording, and archival copies are housed in the University Archives. Project Description Queering the Archives oral history project is a series of oral histories from the LGBTQ+ communities of Weber, Davis and Morgan Counties of Northern Utah. Each interview is a life interview, documenting the interviewee’s unique experiences growing up queer. ____________________________________ Oral history is a method of collecting historical information through recorded interviews between a narrator with firsthand knowledge of historically significant events and a well-informed interviewer, with the goal of preserving substantive additions to the historical record. Because it is primary material, oral history is not intended to present the final, verified, or complete narrative of events. It is a spoken account. It reflects personal opinion offered by the interviewee in response to questioning, and as such it is partisan, deeply involved, and irreplaceable. ____________________________________ Rights Management This work is the property of the Weber State University, Stewart Library Oral History Program. It may be used freely by individuals for research, teaching and personal use as long as this statement of availability is included in the text. It is recommended that this oral history be cited as follows: Paz, Brittny, an oral history by Ky Jackson, 11 August 2022, WSU Stewart Library Oral History Program, Special Collections & University Archives (SCUA), Stewart Library, Weber State University, Ogden, UT. iii Abstract: The following is an oral history interview with Brittny Paz conducted over Zoom with Ky Jackson on August 11, 2022. Brittny talks about growing up in northern Utah in the Latinx culture, and how that effected how she interacted with her queerness and the predominant culture of Utah. She shares how she came to understand her sexuality, dealing with her own mental health and how she continues to find love and acceptance within herself. Also present is Faith Christiansen. KJ: Today is Thursday, August 11 around 5 PM. We are on Zoom conducting an interview with Brittny Paz for the Queering the Archives Project. I'm Ky Jackson conducting the interview, and helping to ask questions is Faith Christiansen. My pronouns are he/him, and I identify as queer. Faith, if you would like to share yours as well? FC: My name is Faith Christiansen, and my pronouns are she/her. KJ: Brittny, if you would like to share with us what your pronouns are and how you identify so that we can keep that in mind going forward, that would be awesome. BP: I am Brittny Paz. My pronouns are she/her, and I identify as panromantic asexual. KJ: With that in mind, I would like to reiterate that if we do ask a question you are not comfortable with, feel free to just tell us and we will completely move ahead. If you mention a name, or if it's a word in a different language, if you would spell it out for us afterwards so that we can make sure your transcription is as accurate as possible, that would be fantastic. All right. Brittny, thank you for your willingness to sit and share your story. I'm going to ask the first question of when and where were you born? BP: I was born in Los Angeles, California, in 1996. KJ: Okay. Did you grow up in Los Angeles? BP: I only lived there for about two years before my family decided to move to Utah. 1 KJ: Where exactly in Utah did you move to? BP: I think it would have been the Clearfield or Layton area, if I'm remembering correctly. KJ: So have you always kind of been in the Davis County, Weber County area? BP: Yes. For the majority of my life, it's been in the Davis County area. KJ: Awesome. What was your family dynamic like growing up? Did you have brothers and sisters or anything like that? BP: It wasn't the most stable upbringing, I'm realizing the older I get. But when you're a child, it's all you know, so you don't think anything of it. My parents moved out here for me, mainly because we didn't live in a very nice area in L.A. There is a lot of gang violence, and they didn't want to raise me around that. I was around two or three. We were living out here and my parents decided to split up. My dad left around that time, I might have been four or five. They split up and my mom did the majority of the raising. I have a younger brother who was born when I was three, so we're three years apart. So she's a single mom raising two kids by herself. She did have a support system here. My abuelita, that's my grandmother, she would babysit. I had my tia—that's aunt in Spanish—she would also help with the raising. We had a support system here, but it was still very difficult for my mom because my mom was quite young. She was a teen mom. She was 16 when she had me, and then she was 19 when she had my younger brother. I have another sibling as well, but she was born when I was 11, so there's quite a big age gap. My mom was much older and I think more mentally equipped to handle parenting. It was different circumstances for her. Then my dad came back. He had went to California for a few years. I think there was just a lot of resentment between him and my mom. He came back when I was around seven or eight years old, and then he's been in the picture ever since. 2 Still a lot of issues. They're first generation, or just immigrants—my dad's an immigrant—so I think there's a lot of generational trauma there. KJ: For sure. Did you grow up and go to school in the Layton/Clearfield area? BP: Yeah, I did. I went to Antelope Elementary in Clearfield. That's the first school I started going to. KJ: Do you have any fond memories from around that time? Not necessarily regarding school, but maybe memories from home or playing with friends or anything like that. BP: I do have fond memories because of the area I grew up in. We were in Section 8 housing because again, my mom was a single mother. As sad as it is to say, when it's more low-income areas, it usually means that it's more diverse crowds, so there are a lot of Latino and Black kids around me. That made me feel a little bit better to be around kids who understood me. Being in school was frustrating because the majority of my classmates were white and Mormon and had really good intentions, but I wasn't raised as a religious person, so it was a little difficult. Then just the casual racism. I was constantly put in ESL, even though I spoke English, every single year. It was just those little things that were frustrating. But that's just what Utah kind of is. FC: I was going to ask, I know that L.A. is a lot more diverse than Utah. A lot of places are. What was it like being around people that were like you, and then coming to Utah and having a totally different demographic? BP: It's hard. Being around people that aren't like you culturally is hard. With Utah, it's even more so, because there's so much religion pushed on to you at the same time. I think a lot of people would judge me just under the guise of wanting to help me and trying to convince me. If I was having a sleepover with a friend, I would have to go to church with them the next day, even though I didn't want to. That's the only 3 way I could have a sleepover with someone. It was always just backhanded compliments like, “Oh, you're a good person, but you don't believe in religion?” I'm like, “I have values. Yes, I do have them.” FC: I was going to ask how the LDS Church has impacted your childhood. BP: Quite a bit, despite not being LDS. Technically, I guess I am. I was baptized when I was 8, but I did not understand what I was doing. I remember a lot of my friends were Mormon because that's just how it is. I would go to church with them sometimes, and missionaries would come. They seemed really nice—not seemed, they were. They're good people. But I was baptized. My parents were really open with me doing that because they just let me make my own decisions. They said, “If you really want to do this, we support you. That's fine.” But the more I actually started going, I did not really agree with anything that was being said, as much as a child understands baptism, like fully understands it. So technically I am LDS, but inactive for a very long time. It was hard. I think so much of my upbringing was just censoring myself to respect others so I wouldn't be judged or offend anyone in any way. I think it was really hard on a lot of my friends as well, who did come out as queer after they left school and weren't around religion or the certain people that we went to school with anymore. Yeah, it was difficult. FC: For sure. Along the same vein, I know there are certain gender roles and stereotypes that come with growing up LDS. But since you didn't explicitly grow up LDS or Mormon, what kind of things were you taught about gender roles growing up? BP: I can't necessarily speak for LDS ‘cause I wasn't raised in it technically. But I was raised in Latinx culture, very much so. I think there were gender roles there. A lot of machismo comes into play. I think that was a big thing that affected me. A lot of, 4 “The man is the provider and the wife needs to take care of the children. With Latinx culture, there's a lot of stereotypes about women being hypersexualized and spicy, all that good stuff. But in terms of gender, even just the language itself is very gendered. It's only recently that the Spanish language has started to include gender-neutral language. There's a lot of tough things with Latinx culture. It is very gendered. A woman should serve her husband. He's the one that's in charge. What he says goes. KJ: Yeah. I think you said in your junior high years was when you really started to feel that you were a little bit different. But before we move on, is there anything else you want to share from early childhood or elementary school? BP: Not necessarily. In terms of queerness, I think it was junior high. Early years, I think we're okay. KJ: Okay, cool. In that case, moving on to junior high. Just as a whole, how was that for you? BP: It was… I don't want to say my whole childhood was awful because it wasn't. There's always good parts and things and experiences for sure, and junior high is hard for everyone. KJ: Exactly. Everyone always hesitates when we ask that question. BP: It's hard for everyone. One of the good things is that I found a lot of hobbies, and I found core friendships. I will say, that was great. I started doing musical theater, so I felt like that was a way to express myself. I was able to do roles where I played boys and girls, so it was a lot of fun for me and I felt like I was really able to express myself. But that was the time when everyone is going through puberty, everyone is having first kisses, everyone is having first sexual experiences. I just remember being really confused about it. I was just like, “I don't know if I feel that urge yet. Maybe I'm just a late bloomer, and that's what this is.” But that feeling just never 5 went away. It just got more frustrating because as you get older, people start having sex. I just was confused why that desire never came to me. It was really apparent in junior high when I was just like, “I don't know if I want to touch people or kiss them. What is this?” KJ: Yeah. Where did you go to Junior high? BP: I went to North Davis Junior High. That's in Clearfield as well. KJ: Gotcha. When you think back on your realization that maybe you don't feel sexual attraction like the other teens do, is there a specific moment that stands out to you when things started to click? BP: I was in student government when I was in junior high. I remember one of the girls in my group, she had come and she was like, “Oh, I just had my first kiss.” Everyone's like, “Oh, that's awesome,” in typical junior high fashion, reacting the way that kids do. I just remember being like, “Are we doing that already?” I was 13, but that was the first time I really felt nervous, I suppose. I felt like there was suddenly this expectation that that's what I should be doing now because I'm that age. I think that's the first moment for me when I realized. It was just someone close to me saying they had their first kiss, and then I was like, “Oh no, now everyone's going to be expecting me to do that, and I don't know that I necessarily want to.” KJ: What was your first like exposure to being queer, or to the concept of like asexuality in general? Did that come later on? BP: Queerness, I was a child. Funny enough, I think it was Christina Aguilera's “Beautiful” video. There are two men kissing in that video. I can't remember how old I was, but I was a child when that music video came out. I remember being confused and asking my mom, like, “Why are those two boys kissing?” 6 My parents are very supportive of LGBTQ, so she just explained it like, “Well, you know, some boys are together, some girls are together. That's just how it is.” It was just as simple as that. So that was me realizing that queerness exists. For asexuality, I think I was in high school, so I didn't realize until much later. I had never heard of it. I just assumed I was immature or something because I wasn't interested in sex. I think I had a lot of internal shame. I was like, “Okay, maybe I'm just immature. Maybe I'm not ready to do this.” KJ: Did you have anyone you could talk to about these feelings? Were your parents open about sexuality growing up? I know they were open about queerness, but more specific sex talks or whatnot. BP: Yeah. My mom, we never had a talk, but she was always clear. “If you are going to have sex, these are the things you should know.” I think I was always aware of it because my mom had me so young, so, I already knew that she had sex at that age and there wasn't protection. She would always let us know, if we were about to, let her know. She'd be happy to make an appointment to talk about the safe choices we should be making. But again, it was always the assumption that, “You will have sex eventually. It's just something that's going to happen to you,” and that made me really nervous. Again, I felt very immature that I wasn't wanting to do that. She is very open with queerness and sexuality and talking to her kids about it. I think she's been pretty good about that. With newer things, I think like most parents, they're a little questionable about it. I don't really talk to her about my queerness now. I think she's just always assumed that's how I am. I just don't feel the need to come out to either of my parents, because I think they've always known that I was a little bit different, and they're okay with it. KJ: That's good. Before we move into high school, I wanted to give Faith the opportunity to ask any questions that you might be sitting on. 7 FC: Did you find any safe spaces in your school or even in your community during junior high? BP: I think in theater, because not to generalize, but whether they know it or not, a lot of queer people do theater. There were a lot of kids in my group who didn't discuss it, but I think we just knew that about ourselves. I had a lot of gay friends, a lot of lesbian friends, and they didn't tell me. I think we all understood that we weren't quite like our straight friends. I don't think I ever talked about it with anyone until high school because I didn't have the words for it. Again, I was around a lot of Mormon kids, so I didn't want to make anyone uncomfortable by discussing sexuality and what they're feeling. I had friends that I could lean on, but definitely didn't get into that as 13-year-olds. KJ: Are there any other memories of junior high you want to share before we move into high school? BP: Not at the moment, no. KJ: I know junior high is structured differently here than where I'm from. Was ninth grade considered junior high for you still? BP: Yes, it was. In Davis County, seventh through ninth grade is junior high. In sixth grade, you're still in elementary school, and then high school is 10th through 12th. KJ: Gotcha. During those three years of high school, at what point did things start to click for you? BP: I think it was towards the end of my senior year. KJ: Building into that, what was high school like for you? How is it different than junior high and what you'd experienced before? Were you still in theater? BP: I was for the first year or so. I felt really inadequate. I had very low self-esteem going into high school. It's hard for kids because it's not the same. You're not necessarily with your same friends anymore. I was very insecure and did not feel 8 comfortable with the people I was around all the time, especially in my theater class. It made me very sad because I loved theater, but I just didn't enjoy the environments and the people I was around, so I quit after that first year. For the last two years, I just was not in a good space. I think there was a lot of stuff I was holding in. Again, part of that was being queer and not having the words for it, or being able to express it without being dismissed. I had an eating disorder during that time in my life. I was very depressed and anxious, and growing up in Latinx culture, that stuff is dismissed. It's not taken seriously at all. It's something you could just pray about and it will go away. But that's just not how it works. They are medical conditions. Those last two years weren't great. I was just experiencing a lot of burnout. I put a lot of pressure on myself to succeed as a firstgeneration American. During the last two years of my schooling, I burnt myself out. I would ditch class a lot. I was bulimic. I don't know if I would call it a ‘friendship’ anymore, but during that time I had a friendship with someone who was constantly pressuring me to be in a relationship with them. I just did not feel comfortable, and I couldn't even explain why I didn't feel comfortable with it. My ‘no’ should have been enough, but it wasn't to this guy. I think he felt like I owed him a relationship, and he would constantly tell people. Everyone, including several teachers, would be like, “You should just date him. He's a good guy.” It was really eating at me because I just didn't, I didn't want to be with this person. I wasn't interested in them romantically or sexually. But again, all of my friends were dating, so I just felt so outside of what everyone was doing. I didn't know who to talk to about it because it seemed like everyone was embracing heterosexuality, which is fine. But I just didn't know who to turn to and talk about it, so I turned to the Internet to really find that. 9 FC: Was the school supportive of your identity at that time? BP: No, they were not. I had a lot of students constantly asking me to just come out already as a lesbian, which was frustrating. First of all, I don't feel the need to come out if I don't know you. That's just me personally. If you want to come out and announce it, that's totally fine. I just didn't feel comfortable telling people that I don't even know. They have no impact on my life. FC: Totally reasonable. BP: It was a lot of people constantly saying I was lesbian. I would go on dates with guys, like group dates, and if I wouldn't kiss them, they would perpetuate that rumor even more that I was gay. It was half true, but I didn't have the choice; it wasn't my say. They were saying it for me, which is very frustrating. I don't think that school was really supportive of queer people because the people that were out, I think that's all people saw. They wouldn't see them as people. They would only see them as, “They’re gay. She's a lesbian. She'll hit on you or something.” I hope it's gotten better. I went to Clearfield High School, by the way. KJ: I was gonna ask. BP: I hope it's a little bit better now that it's been eight years. But no, I did not feel comfortable coming out to anyone at school. FC: I know you talked about your mom giving you… not really a sex talk, but providing you with information on safe sex practices. Did your school teach you sexuality or consent or even healthy relationships? BP: No, the Utah sex education system is absolutely terrible. Maybe it's different for other people, but it was not good for me. I remember I had to take a health class where you covered a variety of subjects regarding health, and obviously one of those things is sexual health. I remember it being extremely judgmental and through 10 the religious eyes of the LDS Church. Abstinence-only was what we learned, which was crazy because I think there was a pregnant person in my class, so that was kind of ironic. It was a lot of internalized misogyny and slut shaming. I’m trying to remember how they phrased it, but it was like, “A girl's virginity is like a piece of gum, and no one wants a chewed-up piece of gum.” I wish I was kidding. That's what they told us. Nothing about consent, which is crazy to me. It was very much just like, “If you're a girl and you have sex, you're a slut. If a guy wants to have sex with you, you guys better be married.” It wasn't inclusive at all, nothing about the possibility that someone might not be heterosexual. It wasn't good at all. They really need to update that. KJ: Yeah, for sure. You said you turned to the Internet to figure out yourself. Do you just want to explain a little bit more about that, and just talk about how you ended up finding the label asexual’? BP: I think it was Googling terms. It started with, “I'm not interested in sex,” and then clicking and clicking and seeing what I could find. When you would search that, it'd be like, “Oh, maybe you have a hormonal imbalance,” which is fair. There are people who are more sexually active and they're wondering that, which is fine. But I was just like, “That still doesn't sound right to me.” It turned into, “Well, I have crushes on people, kind of, but I don't really want to do physical things with them.” I stumbled upon AVEN that way, which is the official asexual website. I can't remember what every letter means, but that's the site for asexuals. Reading that, it really started clicking, so that was really nice. It was nice to realize, like, “This is exactly how I feel.” Sexuality is a spectrum, and so is asexuality. I read ‘asexual’ and I was like, “Well, I don't know about the romantic part because I do experience romantic 11 attraction.” Then I found ‘panromantic,’ where I had had crushes on people of all genders, just not in a sexual way. It was really nice to find that label. ‘ But again, in the environment I was in, I still didn't feel comfortable sharing that with people because I just don't know if they would have understood. Even now, it's hard because I still don't think people take it seriously. You tell people you're gay, and they understand. But when you tell them you're asexual, they don't quite get it. KJ: Especially when you have the panromantic label too. I feel the same way when I'm telling people different labels. I've ended up chalking it up to, “I'm queer.” BP: Yes. I love that term because it encapsulates so much into one. If I feel comfortable, I'll go into it deeper with you, but if not, I'm just giving you ‘queer’. That's all you need to know. KJ: Exactly. All right, so fast forward to the end of your senior year. This is about when you found the label of ace, right? You said you were struggling in high school. Did you end up graduating? BP: I did, barely, mind you. My senior year, I was very depressed. I barely showed up to my second semester and I barely graduated. I had to turn in a packet, and I turned it in on the day of graduation, so I wasn't even sure if I was going to walk. I did, thank God. I think my parents would have killed me. I did graduate, by the skin of my teeth. KJ: Did you have plans for what you wanted to do after graduation? BP: No, not really. I was completely lost, as all kids are at that age. I think there's so much pressure to know what you're going to do when you're a kid. So no, I wasn’t sure. I signed up for classes at Weber for the semester directly after—it would have been fall semester. I went to them and I couldn't focus. I just didn't even know what 12 the point of doing anything was anymore, so I dropped out halfway through fall semester after high school. KJ: Okay. So then where did your life take you? BP: Let's see. When I was 19, I was still very much bulimic and depressed and anxious, just doing odd jobs here and there. I would nanny for people, work at an ice cream shop, just a bunch of like minimum wage, low-effort jobs that I would just quit because I just couldn't do anything. I just couldn't function normally. It got to the point where I started to see a therapist because I was like, “Okay, I need to see someone,” which, again, in Latin culture is not a thing. It's not really encouraged or even known about. I was like, “Okay, I'm just going to take this step and go to therapy and see what it's like.” After the third session, the therapist was like, “Okay, we're going to check you into a psych ward, so call your mom and then go.” I was 19, almost 20 years old, and I got sent to the psych ward for a week. As awful as that experience was, it was a wake-up call for me. I think that definitely helped my eating disorder the most. The depression and anxiety, I still struggle with, but my eating disorder got a lot better from that. It was just kind of hard after that because all my family knew what had happened, and I couldn't quite explain everything to them in a way that they could understand. I think a lot of people think I was being dramatic, which is very upsetting to hear. I think there's a lot of mental illness that runs in my family, undiagnosed, so I think a lot of their thoughts were, “Well, I also feel this way, but I just suck it up and get through it.” I'm like, “Okay, well, that's you, but I personally don't want to do that.” So it was hard, the year I was 20. That was a hard year, from the psych ward to talking with my parents more, doing therapy, taking medication for the first time— 13 which definitely did help me. Personally, it helped a lot, taking medication and doing therapy when I could afford it—because again, therapy is great, but not everyone can afford it, especially in America where we don't even have access to health care. I would do it when I could, but at that time, I really wished I could have afforded to do it multiple times a week. Even once a week would have been nice. Eventually I met my partner, when I was almost 21. He's a cis white guy, grew up very Mormon, but he's not Mormon anymore. That helped me a lot. I think he definitely helped me see that I didn't grow up in the most stable environment. He's like, “That's not normal, these things that happen to you.” I'm like, “Oh, I think you're right, actually.” It's nice. He's very accepting of my orientation and I think we managed to make it work. We've been together for six years. We just bought a townhome together. I think that's been a really good thing in my life. I know people say you should be a completely fixed person before you meet someone, and I just don't know if that's how it always works out. That certainly wasn't the case with me, but I'm really grateful to have met him, because I think he definitely changed my life in a lot of positive ways. He's very supportive of my sexuality and encourages me to speak up with my family. He's great. KJ: That's awesome. Just for reference, at what point did you move out from living with your family? BP: I was 20 years old. I was hospitalized in January of that year, the first week of January, I think, and then I had moved out by June. I was just ready for a change and to be independent. I lived in Ogden actually, on like 36th and Brinker Avenue, somewhere around there. It was nice. It was scary, but I think it was something that I needed to do. I'm glad that my parents were supportive of that. They were worried, of course, but they supported me. That was really nice. KJ: Nice. Did you end up going back to school at all? 14 BP: In 2018, I moved with my partner to North Salt Lake, so I went to SLCC because it's cheaper; community college is great. Four years later, and no, I still haven't finished school. School is very hard for me. I'm someone who preaches about higher education and how important it is, but I think the older I get, the more I realize maybe it's just not for everyone. I think it's good to know your limits. With my interests, I don't know if it's something that I feel pressured into doing anymore, because I think I was definitely going for the wrong reasons. It was more like, “Oh, my parents came to this country for me. I have to do this for them. I have to be rich and successful.” I think them seeing me struggle with that and my queerness changed their mindset and their expectations a little. They always wanted me to be happy, but hearing them say, “You don't have to pressure yourself to go to school. If you're happy and can support yourself, that's fine.” KJ: That's awesome. I had one more question, just out of curiosity. Where did you end up career-wise? BP: Of course. So I currently work as a project manager for CHG Healthcare. I started my first grown-up job, like the corporate 9-to-5, when I was 20, after I had moved out. I worked in a call center. It was awful. Cried every day. Did lots of angry people's health insurance. Then my partner and I moved to Salt Lake because he was working in Salt Lake, and so I found a job at the U, which was a really good experience. I loved being in Salt Lake. I think that definitely helped me express my queerness more and feel a little bit more welcomed by people because it's a lot more diverse there, and a lot more LGBTQIA friendly. That was good. I worked at the U for five years, and then during the pandemic I worked there, but they shut down the division I was working in, so I ended up at CHG. I've been here for like six months now. It’s just corporate 9-to-5, definitely not my dream job, but it pays the 15 bills, and I have health insurance so I can do therapy, so I have to be grateful for that. KJ: Yeah, fair. Faith, do you have anything you want to ask before I get into some of our wrap-up questions? FC: I was just going to ask if you were able to find any other BIPOC queer voices around you in your local communities? BP: Yeah. Salt Lake was really, really great for me. I met so many. just through Instagram, trying to follow people who I seem similar to. I did meet a lot more BIPOC queer people, which was super nice, especially when I found the group…. I am struggling to remember the name right now, but there is a Latinx queer-based group in Salt Lake. Finding out other people were asexual, that was so nice. I definitely loved that. It was great for me. Salt Lake did a lot for me. FC: Salt Lake versus Utah County, there's a big culture shift there, even from Northern Utah. I was wondering if you want to talk about that, or even more queer safe spaces that you were able to find there, compared to Clearfield? BP: Again, Salt Lake and Ogden, I definitely felt the love there. I have friends who own businesses in Ogden. Lavender Vinyl, my friend Kye opened it and they're openly queer. It's been really nice, to see myself, but to also see my friends who are queer flourish in those areas. That's why moving to the area I did move makes me really sad. I live in Layton now, and I hadn't lived here in almost six years, and I was disappointed that nothing had changed a lot. It's still very much conservative, it's suburban, which is fine. You can believe what you want to believe, but I definitely feel like I can't be as outwardly expressive anymore. But again, I know there's good people in every city, and there's queer people in every city. You don't have to live in Salt Lake or Ogden to be queer, but it's harder. It's harder when you aren't in an area that has a queer flag or a Black Lives 16 Matter flag, someone that's so open about what they believe in and being inclusive. It makes me sad, so I try to do it myself. I have like a queer flag hanging from my window. I try to be that person that I liked to see in Salt Lake. Hopefully, if someone lives by me and sees that, maybe they feel included. It's a struggle. It's hard to be queer in a city that's not very accepting and has very certain political views that I don't agree with. It can be a little rough. FC: What do you think Davis County could do to improve that, whether through education or public services? BP: I think everything starts with your mindset. I think opening kids up to different cultures, whether that's queer culture or just any culture that's unlike you, is something that needs to happen. I'm assuming that needs to happen in school if the parents aren't familiar with it. I would love to just see teachers being allowed to teach honest history, which includes people of color, which includes queer people. That's going to expand into sex education. I hope that someday they're able to include people of different genders and different sexualities and what they can do to be safe about things, or even just supportive of others. I think a lot of it is education. You have to teach people. I think especially here, people are raised a certain way, so I don't even know if I necessarily blame them for being ignorant, because that's the way they were taught. But everything can be untaught. I think as long as we're just open, accepting, loving of people, and accept their differences, that will make a lot of difference in every community, not just Layton. FC: What do you think Davis county can do better for BIPOC communities? You kind of answered that, but if you want to go in more detail, you can. BP: From what I've seen in Salt Lake, specifically because I was living there, what I really enjoyed seeing was the community. There's so much community outreach 17 and a lot of caring people with lots of different organizations. There's the Food Justice Coalition. They serve food to unhoused people and they're very inclusive. There's community spaces for queer people. There's Under the Umbrella Bookstore. It's an amazing bookstore. It's open for queer people, and not just queer people, BIPOC people too. I think just creating more spaces or community groups for people would be nice. I don't know how we would regulate that necessarily, because I understand it starts with just one person doing the outreach. I think it would be nice if Davis County maybe considered doing a Black Lives Matter chapter or creating a space for queer teens to express themselves. I think that would be nice, because I see it all over Salt Lake and I think Davis County could benefit from that. FC: Absolutely. KJ: All right, then I just have a couple more questions. One of them is, how do you think representation, whether it's asexuality or specifically Latinx representation, how has it changed over the course of your lifetime? Do you find yourself being represented more, specifically in positive ways? BP: Yeah, there's been a lot of changes. It's been great, not just for Latinx, but I think just BIPOC and queer people in general. I think there's still a lot of work that needs to be done. Specifically talking on Latinx stereotypes, I still think there's very much the stereotype of hyper sexualization in shows like Euphoria or Modern Family. I think that trope is still very much alive, which I don't love, but I do like seeing more Latinx people in shows. I think it's getting better, but there's still work, obviously. In terms of asexuality it could be better. There's not a lot of it, and when there is, it's usually a white guy. Specifically, I'm thinking of BoJack Horseman. I love that they have that episode. I think it's really eye-opening, and it's an important episode, but I wish there was just a little more representation because again, asexuality is a 18 spectrum. I think what asexual representation gets wrong is that they don't include that someone could be biromantic or panromantic. They just focus on, “Oh, this person doesn't want to have sex, so they're asexual.” That's what I noticed in Sex Education as well, which again, was a great episode. I loved that it was a woman expressing that, but they are white. So I think there's some missed opportunities there, that people of color may be asexual, and they may not be asexual and aromantic. They could have different romantic attractions. It's getting better, I think, on most fronts, but it could use a little bit of work. I don't like when it feels forced either, because there's definitely stuff that feels like it's pandering. “Oh, I should like this,” but it doesn't feel authentic. I think the way to change that is to actually have queer and BIPOC people writing these characters. When it's white heterosexual people writing it, there's a disconnect, and it feels like they're filling out a diversity sheet. They're like, “Okay, I've got the black person. I got the gay person.” I just want more authentic representation. FC: Real representation of BIPOC queer people and voices. KJ: I know in the publishing community, which I've dipped my toes into unsuccessfully, they call those ‘#OwnVoices stories.’ I love #OwnVoices stories. BP: Yeah. KJ: We already touched on this a little bit with talking about diversity, whether queer or cultural diversity, but just as a whole, how is Northern Utah, and the different areas in Northern Utah, different from all the other places that you've lived? L.A., Salt Lake, Ogden, Layton. How are they different from each other? BP: Oh, man, there's so much. KJ: I know, it's a loaded question. BP: Predominantly white states are tricky because I think most people don't realize it. If you're not a person of color, you don't think anything of it. That's just what you 19 know. But coming into it, it's a culture shock. Even being raised in it, it's still a culture shock, because I think there's constantly people asking things or commenting on things that they don't know. It's not politically correct, bordering on racist. I think I've been very lucky because I think I look ethnically ambiguous. I am a lot lighter-skinned than a lot of my family, and so I think I've been able to avoid a lot of that, but my brother and my sister have not. They get a lot more of it. I think it's changing a little bit more for sure. I think people are a lot more accepting of BIPOC people, just understanding the struggles that they go through and showing a lot more respect. But with queerness, it's still hard. Again, I think a lot of people are accepting of gay people because they know that there's been a lot of representation of it in media. They know it and they can understand it. Even if they don't like it, they know that it's there. But Utah has a lot of work to do. It's very frustrating. I'm not saying L.A. is perfect. Just because it's diverse doesn't mean it's this like paradise. Obviously, there's a lot of issues... FC: It makes a big difference though. BP: Yeah, it definitely is a big difference. In L.A., the area I grew up in, obviously there's a lot of people who look like me, who understand my culture, but it wasn't always the safest place to be queer. There's a lot of machismo, there's a lot of gang violence, a lot of violence against women and queer people. I haven't lived in L.A. in a long time, so maybe that is changing as well. But I feel safer in Utah being open about those things, much more than I feel when I go to L.A. and I am back in my community. I don't feel as safe, which is really sad because I should feel more safe in my community but I don't. There's still a lot of religion steeped in Latin culture as well, but the difference is, living here in Utah, people are a little more passiveaggressive when they don't agree with you on certain things. It could be politics, it 20 could be religion, but they're passive-aggressive. In Latin culture, it's aggressiveaggressive. My family in L.A., I don't think they quite understand me, and it hurts because that is my family. Culturally with queerness, they're not quite there yet. Utah's maybe a little bit closer, but again, I think it's just because I grew up here. It's hard to say with L.A. I've only gone back on trips, but it’s just different. KJ: All right. Our final big question for today. If there's anything you could go back and say to your younger self, or maybe to someone else who's going through the same situation as you were, what would you say to yourself or to them? BP: I think I would tell myself that I am not being dramatic or unreasonable. The feelings that I have are completely valid. They're real. They are what other people experience as well, and you're not alone in thinking that way. It's the generic answer for queer people, but it really is true. You're not alone. It's good to find your community. I won't encourage people to come out if they don't feel like they're safe in doing that, but I think it's good to just find your community, even if it’s on the Internet, because eventually, that's going to lead to real-life friends. You're not alone. Other people are very similar to you. Something I would like to tell other people who are asexual: Just because you may have sex, that does not negate your asexuality. Just like lesbians who may sleep with men, or gay men who may sleep with women before realizing your sexuality are still valid, how you identify yourself is valid. If you’re asexual and have had sex, that doesn't negate it. Just own your ace-ness. KJ: Yeah, that's a big one. Is there anything else that you want to ask, Faith? FC: I have information that you may or may not want. Yesterday, there was a potluck for specifically BIPOC queer people to go to. They're trying to build a small community, and I don’t want to overstep, but if you are looking for a community, it is for Davis 21 and Weber counties. If you want that information, talk to Pedro, and he’ll get you all set up to go to monthly activities where it's just the BIPOC queer community. I can send it to you if you want it. BP: I would love that. You're not overstepping at all. KJ: If this project is still around, would you be willing to be re-interviewed 5 to 10 years in the future? BP: Oh, I'd love to. KJ: Awesome. Thank you so much for your willingness to share. You provided a lot of views on things that we don't really get a lot of. We get the more traditional white Mormon experience, but it's always really good to hear from people who have had other experiences growing up in Utah. This is infinitely valuable. BP: Oh, I'm so glad. I saw the poster on 25th Street. I was like, “Oh, you know what? I'm going to do that. I'm sure they get a lot of white people, so add something to the mix.” KJ: Yes, absolutely. Many thanks. 22