The LGBTQIA+ community has had increasing amounts of support from straight, cisgender “allies”. As awesome as that is, we’re finding more and more that this support is conditional. Only if we’re good enough do we deserve it. I find that quite troubling. Here are fifteen of the most common things I hear, and I feel need to be addressed.

1. "There’s too many letters! Do they really all need to be there?”

Yes. They do. The acronym is LGBTQIA+. We know there are countless identities, hence the plus. These aren’t just letters. They represent entire populations of people. We are talking about human beings with lives, thoughts, and feelings, not just a letter. Stop the erasure of people.

2. “The ‘A’ stands for ally!”

No it doesn’t. It stands for asexual/aromantic (they are two separate identities though, they should not be confused). You are not a part of this community. You are welcome to support it, and you should, but understand you are not the focus.

3. “You just want everything to be gay!”

I mean sure. No. I’m kidding. We want representation. Everything we see is straight: the books we read, the shows and movies we watch, advertising, all of it saturated with boy meets girl and they fall in love. It’s exhausting. We aren’t an abnormality and we shouldn’t be treated as such in the media. We want more positive representation of our community.

4. “I have a gay friend, I’m not homophobic.”

Having someone as a token friend is incredibly offensive to the friend in the first place. In all reality, there are people within the LGBTQIA+ community who are homophobic, biphobic, transphobic, or otherwise discriminating. Nothing excuses you from any form of social injustice, and unless we are actively working to correct it, we are still problematic.

5. “No, that’s not offensive.”

As someone not in the community, you don’t get to decide what is and isn’t offensive to us. I don’t care if you have a friend who’s gay and they aren’t offended by it. They don’t speak for the entirety of the community, and if someone tells you it offends them, you need to respect that and move on. Everyone has different experiences and is incredibly diverse in what they are and are not comfortable with.

6. “I know what it feels like to be oppressed! I’m an ally!”

No. You don’t. You will never be shouted at, pushed around, called slurs, spit on, attacked or harassed, or kicked out because you’re an ally. You don’t get to compare your privileged experiences to those of people being discriminated against. People might not like your views, but they’ll still look at you as a human being.

7. “It’s over! You can get married now!”

Marriage equality was a great step! However, there are still so many rights not yet won for our community. There is always work to be done.

8. “They were born a boy, right?”

The issue here is that our society thinks genitals=gender. Gender is an identity, and there are hundreds of them. Sex is physiological, and guess what-there’s more than two! Intersex erasure is a huge problem all on its own. Regardless, we were all assigned a gender at birth. That does not mean we ever were that gender.

9. “Well, aren’t gay people heterophobic?”

I will not say that anyone in the LGBTQIA+ community is free of any hatred or social injustice. But the difference here is that homophobia, transphobia, biphobia, etc. are all based in a societal based oppression. Last I checked, straight people aren’t exactly being attacked for being straight.

10. “Wow! You are so pretty for a trans girl!”

There are so many things wrong here. So. So many things. Ever heard of backhanded compliments? This is like one, but worse. This statement is wholly implying that the average trans girl is ugly, which is based in this thing called transmisogyny-or the discrimination of trans women.

11. “So, how do you…ya know…do it?”

Would you like it if I asked you that? (I hope not…) It’s none of your business what someone does with their partner. If you’re really that curious, Google exists.

12. “But you’re a girl right, like, in your pants?”

Again, how comfortable would you be if I asked you that? It’s none of your business. Not to mention, genitals do not define gender.

13. “So, who wears the pants in the relationship?”

We should probably ditch the idea that there has to be a dominant position in the relationship. In a healthy relationship, regardless of the genders of the people in it, it should be an equal partnership.

14. “Wait, you’re not hitting on me right?”

I think my favorite response to this is ‘don’t flatter yourself’. Think about it, are you attracted to EVERYONE of the gender you prefer? I doubt it. Additionally, LGBTQIA+ people aren’t just sexually driven robots trying to hit on everyone on their preferred gender.

15. “You don’t look gay.”

And what exactly does gay look like? What does bi look like? How about pan? Ace? Yeah, I don’t know either. What do straight people look like? (Are you starting to pick up on how ridiculous it sounds? Good.)

I’m appreciative of the decent allies our community has, but I am so tired of having to deal with these, among many other problematic statements. It hurts to hear these things, and then to hear that this is supposedly in support of you and your community. Continue to support the LGBTQIA+ community, but know there is always room to learn and grow.