Queering the Earring: Piercings are Gay

Graphic by Agnes Lee

When the pandemic sent me off campus, I returned to my childhood bedroom full of existential questions about my identity. Nine months later when I came back to campus, I had seven piercings. While home, I considered how I performed for others and how I truly wanted to present. 

Enter a newfound obsession with piercings. 

I love to over-accessorize, and piercings allowed me to adorn myself in more ways. As a Depop seller might put it, my ears were an old pair of Y2K jeans just waiting to be bedazzled. 

Piercings were also a way for me to rebel against the gender binary and heteropatriarchal norms that harshly dictate gender performance and expression. I wouldn’t say that I pierced my ears because I’m queer, but I would say that because I’m queer, I love piercings. 

Some people's love language is touch, while others prefer words of affirmation or acts of service. Quality time is great, but I’ve learned that my true love language is poking holes in peoples’ ears. On my third date with my boyfriend, I gave him a piercing. It felt strangely euphemistic at the time. 

I’ve since pierced him twice more, and have become something of a local Piercing Pagoda to my friends and roommates, including junior Emma Yarger.

On my right ear, I have two lobe piercings, two helix piercings and a rook piercing. Image courtesy of Alex Chun.

I gave Emma their lobe triples, bringing them to 8 piercings total. They say that piercings have allowed them to construct their aesthetic in a way that is entirely in their control.

“My aesthetic cannot be detangled from queerness,” Emma says. “Androgyny to me feels like a way to push back against gender and cultural norms. For so long, piercings also have been that. There’s something rebellious about having a lot of piercings and wearing a lot of jewelry, and I revel in how it deconstructs norms.” 

Emma Yarger has 3 lobe piercings and a helix piercing on their left ear. Image courtesy of Alex Chun.

Queer people have a history with piercings. A 1991 article from the New York Times claimed that gay men could be identified by their earrings, stating that they “often [wore] a single piece of jewelry in the right ear to indicate sexual preference.” 

And while it is now clearly understood that a piercing is not a legitimate indicator of sexuality or gender identity, it seems that throughout history, piercings have been linked to queerness in contemporary Western culture.

Piercings have roots in world history as well, with evidence of King Tut having worn earrings. Julius Caesar, Francis Drake and even William Shakespeare also sported ear accessories. 

However, as contemporary Western society began to develop, piercings fell out of fashion for men. Excessive piercings began to symbolize rebellion and were regarded as taboo.

While piercings are now relatively mainstream, they remain a way for individuals to disrupt normative expectations. And nobody loves messing with presentation and gender norms more than the queer community. 

Junior Maia [last name redacted for privacy] currently has a helix, a nostril and five lobe piercings with a plan to get more soon. She says her favorite is her helix piercing because she got it during the winter of her freshman year when she was just beginning to understand her queer identity. 

“I associate this piercing with the time I was actually telling myself that I was queer,” Maia says. “Over the past year and a half or so, I’ve been accepting things about myself and owning them. I’ve felt more empowered to change the way that I both perceive myself and the way that others perceive me. I think that piercings are cool because you can really fuck around with them and do whatever you want and put in different earrings and like, do something stupid, like, today, I was wearing a crab earring.”

Maia is a Cancerian and very proud of it. 

Maia recently got a nostril piercing. Image courtesy of Alex Chun.

Maia recently got a nostril piercing. After she and her friends were fully vaccinated, they ventured out to Andersonville to peruse thrift stores and get pierced.

Maia says that after she got the piercing, she experienced a week of regret as she adjusted to the new look. However, her decision to disrupt how she had previously presented ended up being the reason she fell in love with her new piercing.

“I wasn’t used to it yet,” Maia says. “And it wasn’t the face I grew up with. But that turned out to be why I like it so much. I feel like I’ve reclaimed my face.”

To be queer is to rebel against binaries, expectations and societal structures. It is living in the undefinable, the non-normative. Piercings are often associated with defiance, so it makes sense that queer people love them. It’s also a way for queer people to reclaim their presentation — even if it’s something as simple as a stud. 

“The act of piercing feels like a disruption of something,” Maia says. “But it's also the personalization, because no two piercings are gonna land in the same place. Everyone has differently shaped ears, differently shaped noses. You can do whatever the fuck you want with your piercings.”

Junior Freedom Gobel had a similar experience to both Maia and me. Although her ears were pierced when she was a baby, she got a septum piercing during her freshman year at Northwestern when she became more comfortable with her sexuality.

“I didn't get it because of my sexuality, but I definitely think there are some connections there,” Gobel says. “I got my septum piercing when I started to become more comfortable expressing my bisexuality. The septum was a representation of me feeling more comfortable with myself and my choices and being who I am.”

Freedom Gobel has an assortment of septum rings that she swaps out regularly. Image courtesy of Alex Chun.

Freedom has since gotten a nostril piercing as well, but the septum remains her favorite because it symbolizes rebellion.

“Getting both of my nose piercings was something I could do because I liked it and not because I needed approval from my parents,” Freedom says. “Especially the septum because my mom was in clear opposition to it.”

Maia and I were born a day apart and are proud Cancerians. We have matching crab earrings. Image courtesy of Alex Chun.

I started getting piercings as I began to understand my identity. After I pierced my ears, I soon bought a pair of silver butterfly studs. They’re small and in desperate need of polish, but they remain one of my favorites. Butterflies have long been a symbol for transgender, nonbinary and gender nonconforming people because they signify a metamorphosis — growth, change and a newfound finding of oneself.