Heterosexual Chinese Americans’ experiences of their lesbian and gay sibling’s coming out.

Abstract

This qualitative study explored the experiences of second-generation heterosexual Chinese and Taiwanese Americans who have gay biological siblings. Participants had been aware of their gay sibling's sexual orientation for over 2 years. Ten participants, 3 Chinese Americans and 7 Taiwanese Americans, completed demographic questionnaires and in-depth, semistructured interviews. Interviews were audiotaped, transcribed, and analyzed using grounded theory methodology. The authors explored the participants' overall experience in relation to their gay sibling's coming out, how their sibling and family relationships evolved over time, and how traditional Asian values were related to their worldview and relationships to family members over time. Five major themes emerged: (a) various personal reactions to finding out about their gay sibling, (b) intrapersonal changes of heterosexual individual who has a gay sibling, (c) evolving sibling relationship between heterosexual and gay sibling, (d) evolving family relationships following disclosure, and (e) interplay of culture and lesbian and gay sexual orientation following discovery of gay sibling's sexual orientation. The results of the interviews highlighted the importance of sibling relationships to the coming out process for gay siblings. Siblings typically bonded over the gay sibling's sexual orientation disclosure, became more self-reflective and self-aware, and became more politically active. Participants' struggles in accepting their gay sibling's sexual orientation revolved around conflicts between lesbian and gay sexual orientation and their ethnic cultural values, family values, and faith. Implications for future research are presented.

A model of intersectional stress and trauma in Asian American sexual and gender minorities.

“…A MODEL OF INTERSECTIONAL STRESS AND TRAUMA bracing their sexual identities (Huang, Chen, & Ponterotto, 2016;Kimmel & Yi, 2004). These include the emotionally painful risks of failing at filial piety (i.e., the cultural virtue of honoring parents' expectations and safeguarding the family's reputation; Hu & Wang, 2013), deviating from masculine/feminine norms and roles (e.g., "male" being equivalent to "husband" and "father" in the Hmong language; Boulden, 2009), and "losing face," thereby stigmatizing one's parents within one's ethnic community.…”

The impact and implications of two or more children identifying as lesbian, gay, or bisexual (LGB) within the family system

“…Disclosing one's sexual minority status to a sibling with whom they have a strong sibling relationship can also act as a safeguard against other taxing incidences. Huang, Chen and Ponterotto (2016) discovered that for some LGB individuals, sibling support buffers psychological pain including internalized homophobia and victimization and increases the LGB sibling's self-acceptance and comfort. Hilton and Szymanski (2014), found that heterosexual siblings are more accepting of their LGB sibling when they have had contact with LGB individuals, greater knowledge of the LGB community, take a supportive stance on civil rights, and tend to have a more liberal ideology when it comes to political affiliations (Hilton & Szymanski).…”

“…Specifically, I will address the gaps in the literature outlined above by conducting in depth over the phone interviews with LGB individuals who have LGB siblings and utilizing a Feminist theoretical foundation to further understand results and implications. There has been a growing amount of research examining the sibling relationship when a sibling comes out as lesbian, gay or bisexual (LGB) (Hilton & Szymanski, 2011;Hilton & Szymanski, 2014;Savin-Williams & Ream 2003;Huang, Chen, & Ponterotto, 2016).…”

“…Scholars have found the significant influence siblings have on the LGBT community with statistics showing LGBT individuals coming out first to their siblings before anyone else (Savin- Williams & Ream, 2003). Scholars have also examined LGBT individuals coming out to their heterosexual siblings (Hilton & Szymanski, 2011;Hilton & Szymanski, 2014;Savin-Williams & Ream 2003;Huang, Chen, & Ponterotto, 2016), yet there has been limited studies exploring the sibling relationship when there is more than one LGB sibling within the family system. Dank (1971) wrote a case study on a family consisting of six LGB siblings with findings including significant parental influence on their coming out processes and the importance of relatability in terms of sexual orientation.…”

“…Studies have shown that the sibling relationship helps with the coming out process by having an ally present through the process (Huang, Chen and Ponterotto, 2016). This review seeks to explore and answer the question: What does the family process look like when more than one…”