Identity Labels Quotes

You know, it's flattering when there's a rumor that says I'm bisexual. It means I can play more kinds of roles. I'm open to whatever people want to call me. I've never really been attracted to men sexually, but I don't think I would be afraid of it if it happened.

Being bisexual, being bipolar, being biracial - it's been used to define me, but I am desperate to be indefinable.

I don't like labels, but if you have to put a label on it, I'm a gay man.

Sometimes I have a very fleeting emotional dance with a fleeting phrase, like 'half-Mexican.'

A lot of people think that I am trans but I'm not trans. I am a gay male with hair and nails. So if you say 'he' or 'she' it doesn't matter. I know who I am.

I had no words for these feelings. And then people started using the word Ms. Suddenly, there was this handle with which I could identify myself and understand why I felt so out of whack with the culture around me.

Old friends call me Sea Salt, because my last name is Salter. Or Cocoa, cause my real first name is Courtney.

Before the word gay had really been invented, was there's no such thing. Only a country, basically as mindless about these matters - based upon our peasant superstitions, religious superstitions - would they make categories. Everybody's everything.

I don't use labels a lot.

Everyone is their own kind of lesbian. To think there's a certain way to dress or present yourself in the world is just one more stereotype we have to fit into.

The word 'feminist' is a word that discriminates, and I'm not into that. I don't think there has to be a separation in life in anything. [...] Labels are for other people to understand us, so for me, I know how I feel and I don't need to call myself a 'feminist' or 'not a feminist' because I know what my truth is.

Even with whatever people want to label me with, there are so many other sides to me.

Let's not confuse the words immigrant and alien.

For Americans I'll always be Israeli, and for Israelis I'll always be American. But I really have no need for definitions.

Straight people say, 'You know you're just gay,' and gay people say, 'You know you're just gay.' There is such a thing as bisexual!

So for everybody who allows themselves to be separated from me because I said 'African' instead of 'Nubian' or 'Black' or 'Kemet' or 'original' or 'Israelite,' don't be so foolish. I say 'African' because the continent of Africa is the land from which we all originate. It is the word that we are most familiar with right now.

I think we use a lot of words and labels when trying to describe people: ones with autism, ones without autism. In general, I think that labeling people is a major issue, and people don't understand the power of language.

Part of the reason why I've never said that I was gay until now was because I didn't want that adjective assigned to my name for all of eternity. You know, gay Rosie O'Donnell.

What we really have to do is stop the adjective before the job title — whether it's 'black actor,' a 'gay actor' or 'anything actor,' Everybody thinks that equality comes from identifying people, and that's not where equality comes from. Equality comes from treating everybody the same regardless of who they are. I hope the media and the press catches on to that because it's time to move out of 1992.

I think that's a place where we are, as a society, finally starting to get to now: where your sexuality doesn't have to define you - and you don't have to define it.

We wear a lot of labels in our lives, and it's so very easy to be defined by them. We have grown somehow accustomed to thinking of ourselves as a size eight or a size fourteen, as a capricorn or a taurus, as single or in love.

A lot of people say I’m bent and I’ve heard it so many times I’ve almost learned to accept it ... I couldn’t stand to be thought of as a big butch lady. But I know I’m as perfectly capable of being swayed by a girl as by a boy. More and more people feel that way and I don’t see why I shouldn’t.

I've never concerned myself with the labels people want to put on you. What matters to me is my own estimation.

Examine the labels you apply to yourself. Every label is a boundary or limit you will not let yourself cross.

Can words such as Orthodox, Jew, or Catholic really express some sort of exclusive personal virtues or merits?