JoJo Siwa Coming Out Was Important For Her Young Audience – But It Shouldn’t Be This Shocking

Today, JoJo Siwa is trending on Google after posting her first pictures with her girlfriend, Kylie since coming out last month. At the time, she wore a t-shirt that said ‘Best. Gay. Cousin. Ever’ in an Instagram Live video, but told a fan who asked ‘What label are you?’ that she wasn’t comfortable labelling herself just yet because she wasn’t sure what she best identified with.

‘I have thought about this, but the reason I'm not going to say this answer is because I don't really know this answer,’ she explains. ‘I think humans are awesome, I think humans are really incredible people. Right now, I'm super-duper happy and I want to share everything with the world but I also want to keep things in my life private until they are ready to be public. Right now what matters is that you guys know that no matter who you love, that it's okay.’

Posting about her new girlfriend, JoJo explained that she and Kylie have been best friends for over a year but are now celebrating their one month anniversary together as girlfriends. It is, of course, an exceptional moment for her young audience and has been rightly celebrated by fans. While JoJo is 17-years-old, her audience is mostly young children and spans 12.2million subscribers on YouTube alone.

Perhaps that explains the intrigue then, because there is certainly a lot. Looking at the trending search terms for JoJo Siwa this morning, in the last four hours alone there were countless people Googling ‘JoJo Siwa sexuality’, ‘Who is JoJo Siwa girlfriend’ and ‘Is JoJo Siwa LGBT’.

Considering it’s been three weeks since she came out, the overwhelming interest in her sexuality is interesting. Yes, she’s a teen icon and it’s absolutely an important moment in educating children about LGBT issues – but is it really THIS compelling that a 17-year-old girl has come out? Are people simply wanting to find out more about her to celebrate her sexuality, or are they just incredibly surprised at the mere existence of a queer woman?

If they are, they shouldn’t be. According to a 2019 study by J. Walter Thompson Innovation Group, more than half of Gen-Z (Aged 13 to 20 at the time) do not identify as strictly heterosexual, compared to 35% of millennials. It stands to reason then that while any person choosing to come out publicly should be celebrated for their bravery, this ongoing fixation with JoJo in particular seems somewhat… strange.

Specifically, when it comes to her new relationship. JoJo is only 17, and while her girlfriends age is unknown it’s clear she’s also a teenager – is it not somewhat uncomfortable for everyone to be this obsessed with the ins and outs of their relationship purely because they’re queer? You only need to Google ‘JoJo Siwa girlfriend’ to see tons of stories - written in publications predominantly aimed at grown adults, I might add - detailing everything the world knows about Kylie.

Would the world be as obsessed if JoJo were a man? If we’re leaning towards no, then perhaps the conversation we should be having is not about the particulars of a celebrity teens new relationship, but lesbian erasure at large. Because, one would hope we were at a point in time when a young woman coming out as gay garnered a mere, well-meaning shrug of acceptance – but for it to be this surprising proves otherwise. For it to still be this big of a deal proves that the lesbian community at large needs more attention, particularly in reference to the bravery it obviously takes to come out.

In fact, JoJo herself touched on this in her Instagram Live. ‘I know everyone's situation is different and it might be harder for some people and easier for some people to come out or be themselves but I think coming out has this stigma around it — that it's this really, really scary thing, but it's not anymore,’ JoJo said. ‘There are so many accepting and loving people out there that it's okay. Of course people are going to say it's not normal, but nothing is normal. Literally not one thing about anybody is normal and it's okay not to be normal, it's okay to be a little different… That's something we should never, ever be afraid of. That's something we should be proud of. I'm the happiest I've ever been, that's what matters.’

And while one would hope JoJo’s more positive experience speaks to the majority of queer women, globally, lesbian erasure and prejudice is still a huge problem. According to a 2016 report researching the way that laws against homosexuality impact women – the first of its kind – it was found that it is illegal to be a lesbian in almost a quarter of all the countries in the world.

The report further found that lesbian’s and bisexual women are particularly vulnerable to certain kinds of human rights abuses due to the combination of their gender and sexual orientation, according to the Human Dignity Trust - a legal charity that supports challenges to anti-gay laws – who produced the report. Violations include family violence, forced or pressured heterosexual marriage, and so-called ‘corrective’ rape. They’re also more likely to be at an economic disadvantage due to gender discrimination, further forcing women into unsafe situations.

It goes to show that by facing the uniquely different battles of sexism and homophobia – as well as various other types of prejudice depending on who is coming out – gay women are still an incredibly vulnerable group. Even in countries where LGBT issues are treated less oppressively, lesbian erasure exists at large – with common stigmas including the idea that who love women are ‘going through a phase’ or not to be taken seriously.

It’s undoubtable that JoJo likely faced similar stigma from the public in response to her coming out, especially given her age, but what we should take away from all of this is that we’re clearly not as far along as a progressive society as many think we are. If we were, JoJo wouldn’t be dealing with any homophobic abuse (one parent commented on her announcement ‘My daughter will never watch you again’, to near 6,000 likes) nor would anyone be this supremely shocked that a young woman could love women. It might be 2021, but there’s still a lot of work to do to create a safer world for queer women.

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