Why Are Lesbians So Obsessed with Harry Styles?
I still, to this day, have the vivid memory of sitting with friends around a computer at the age of 12 watching One Direction’s music video for “One Thing.” It was an objectively mediocre song; I don’t think any of us actually liked it, but afterwards, everyone was committed to this band. We were making a commitment together, therefore, each of us would choose one of the boys. I chose the blond first, at random, but then my friend informed me she had already chosen Niall, so I had to switch to Louis. Louis it was. I was a Louis girl.
Almost everyone was a Harry girl or wanted to be, and it was clear that people saw him in many different ways. I was too busy paying attention to Louis, so I didn’t give him much mind at the time; I thought Harry was too obvious an answer to the “Who’s your favorite?” question. I liked Louis, retroactively, because he was funny and liked Peter Pan. Those specific traits made it make sense that I would like him, that he was my favorite. It was like I was making sure I had a detailed cover story over the crime of my lesbianism, but I had no idea I was doing it.
Some people thought of Harry as the sweet one, some as a womanizer, and some, inexplicably, as a bad boy. I remember a girl I never cared for went on and on about him, saying he was “too hot to be gay,” as that was a hot topic on people’s minds, even back then. It was definitely on my mind. Once I began to look closer, I saw him as someone who loved his friends and spent time with them doing something he loved. I saw him as someone who loved his friends, so, so much. And at a time where I was quietly realizing that my female friendships and relationships were the most important thing to me, I saw myself in him. Consequently, I began to love Harry Styles.
Everyone easily projected different desires onto him — he was so censored by his band’s fame that he was, after the X-Factor and before his solo debut, almost a blank slate. There was a running idea that he was deep, that he felt so much. I clung to random ideas that he was heartsick through lyrics, that he may be in love with a friend (listen to “Change My Mind” off of Take Me Home), the idea that he was sad but, of course, always beautiful. Always desirable, and always so loved.
Then, when all of us were a little bit older and a little bit queerer, his self-titled album came out in 2017. Was he also queer? That didn’t matter — this album was PINK and full of love and pain and lyrics that absolutely beg young lesbians to write in their little gay journals. There was a way that he expressed his independence through his style — as he grew and evolved into himself, he changed his looks, he played with masculinity and femininity, and it seemed like everyone (save king of homophobia Liam James Payne) loved it and loved him all the while. So many lesbians know his eras like we know our own: times of gothness, of short hair or long hair, of matte foundation and daily winged eyeliner.
So much of Harry Styles promised a new beginning, a new Harry, a new era. The lyrics reflected being sad and feeling in love and how sometimes this feel so pathetic, particularly “From the Dining Table.” “Sign of the Times” was on the radio and practically everyone heard it — he was finally allowed to sing about the necessity of being open and feeling people understand and love you, and letting that need build up and overwhelm you. This feeling was so easy to ventriloquize through Harry’s lyrics of “We don’t talk enough, we should open up, before it’s all too much.” It felt like it fit like a glove.
He was travelling to sing these songs and wear the most beautifully ornate suits any of us had ever seen. Do we want to be him? What is gender? Who are we? No need for answers; it was so easy to just admire, and even stan, this new era of Harry.
Amongst my queer friends, the “Lights Up” music video felt like the Superbowl. It was such a distant experience from the feeling of community surrounding that computer years ago, watching a music video with the same person in it, but grown away from the past. It felt like a happy song, and so did his later single of “Adore You”; they could easily be coming out narratives, another round of Harry Styles songs so ready for projection. In the “Adore You” video he even uses the shout of his pain as a way to push him forward into the future, opening the jar it’s kept in and letting it out against the sails of his boat. And now, in his personal life, he’s wearing rings and painting his nails and it’s still so easy to love him. He gets to be feminine and masculine and never seen as a danger, while us queer folks sometimes still have to worry about being seen as a danger. He even makes jokes about having gay sex! Harry Styles is our king! Everyone loves him! Maybe everyone could love us, too.
I love Harry Styles, I do. I was trained to back in 2012 with all those other girls, and then that love changed as I changed. Now here we are, in 2019, and I am realizing that Harry Styles is just a person. He is a very rich person, he is close to an apolitical person, he is not a woman, and he dates beautiful models like Camille Rowe. He’s that person. But, he is also a sweet smile and the writer of thoughtful songs and the reason why queer fans hold pride flags up in his stadium concerts. I have found and loved many more queer icons since I was 13 and saw Harry for the first time, especially after coming out. Many are much easier to understand from the outside when my idolization of them is placed next to my lesbianism, and many are likely more deserving of that idolization and support, but I will love Harry forever. He is a part of so many memories of when I was younger and I didn’t have the words or the confidence to voice my queerness. That past can feel so distant from now; the closet can feel so distant from the present, but he is a link to it that makes sense, and his evolution is a continuing story. I feel a lot of love recognizing other queer women feeling similar sentiment towards him.
He is a piece of our 2012 youth that still resonates today—when the past and the closet can seem so disconnected from the present—and that is a step towards seeing such that nostalgia and affirming experience in each other.
About the Author
Julia Cunningham (she/her) is a second year at the George Washington University studying International Affairs. She likes listening to Ribs by Lorde and watching queer cinema.
