Professional Documents
Culture Documents
follow snippets in italics. The writer in my opinion raises powerful points.
THE FAMILY NORM
Homosexuals are taught – by heterosexuals – to expect and even yearn for what, given
societal attitudes, is impossible under a different lifestyle. Warring attempts to fuse
heterosexual expectations and homosexual needs and realities create the contradictions
in the gay world.
Impossible? Lifestyle? One of the 2006 Reports of The National Gay and Lesbian task
Force in the US indicates that more than 60% of gay relationships are open.
I should not be judging here given the fact that in a free libertarian society people should
have the freedom to be able to pursue their desires. After all we do increasingly have
swinger clubs and the like in a heterosexual setting and have always had a tradition of
concubines and adultery not to mention the presence of prostitution.
But are these swinger clubs, legalized prostitution, free sex mingling really what we want
as a human race? If we accept these as natural and regard the traditional mode of a family
unit or its creation as ‘impossible’ then we should not make statements like the writer
makes later on:
That may be in large part because what holds other minorities together – ready
identification, familial ties – is absent from the gay minority:
If we are saying that the creation of a monogamous relationship with children is
impossible, then why complain about the fact that the family unit is absent in the gay
world? That is, if we are not willing to put the effort, sacrifice, patience and commitment
to build a family that watches over each other through thick and thin, then let’s not go
‘woe be to us’. As one sows so one reaps.
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EMPHASIS ON OUTER AS OPPOSED TO INNER
The obsession with youth and appearance which makes us beautiful can make us
desperate. (Old homosexuals wasted – we cast away even the heroic fighters who “came
out” when it was really courageous; we have no tradition of respect.)
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The fulfilling freedom of orgies may, in the exclusive extreme, cancel out love, the dark
side of cruising freezing all tenderness.
A magazine prints a glossary of “symbols” – coloured handkerchiefs, single earrings,
keys, all displayed to indicate desired sexual positions and acts – but doesn’t point out
that these symbols may obviate even the few exploratory words we might otherwise
exchange to discover each other, in sex, yes, but also, at least at times, BEYOND sex;
extending rather than limiting possibilities.
We emphasize the sexual act so much that in pursuing that excitement, that fantasy we
end up in that never quenching desire of being youthful, becoming a slave to all these fads
and trends on looks and physiques. We no longer remain happy with our own unique
looks and try to fit the ‘Abercrombie’ look or follow the latest ‘Atkins Diet’ in pursuit of
the flat abs perfection.
This is one reason I am never fond of gay advertisements always being about two young
shirtless men in sexual poses.
Jenna (Jennifer Garner’s character) says in the movie 13 going on 30:
Who are these women? Does anyone know? I don't recognize any of them. I want to see
my best friend's big sister, the girls from the soccer team, my next door neighbor, real
women who are smart and pretty and happy to be who they are. These are the women to
look up to. Let's put life back into the magazine. And fun and laughter and silliness. I
think we all I think all of us want to feel something that we've forgotten or turned our
backs on because maybe we didn't realize how much we were leaving behind. We need to
remember what used to be good. If we don't, we won't recognize it even if it hits us
between the eyes.
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UNIFORMITY AND DIVERSITY
Gay must be allowed variations. It is gay fascism to decree that one must perform this sex
act, and must allow that one, in order to be gay;
Masculine homosexuals still heckle queens, who are true heroheroines of our time,
exhibiting more courage for walking one single block in drag than a straightlooking gay
to “come out” on a comfy campus.
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Fear of threatened taunts on our “masculinity” pushes us to become posturing studs in
fascist uniforms.
If we teach the young ones from Dr. Seuss in all our coming out workshops, ‘Be who you
are and say what you feel, because those who mind don't matter and those who matter
don't mind.’, then let us also prepare them for the gay world which is very unforgiving on
the slightest hint of femininity.
It is encouraged to accept a passive role in sex, but mannerism out of the question. While
people may be attracted to masculinity, do we also not perpetuate the heterosexual norm
that this is how men should behave?
*********************
OWNING RESPONSIBILITY
Fear of rejection, at the root of so much of gay isolation, alienates us from each other and
often makes us mean.
And the most grotesque – heavily rationalized – reflection of the heterosexual world’s
hatred of the gay, is the proliferation of sadomasochism.
Here I’ll disagree. Let’s not blame the heterosexual others for our failure to grow up and
be stuck up in perpetuating sadomasochism.
There is no excuse for mean and bad behavior. Faith based teachings come in handy here,
when Jesus teaches to respond to meanness with a smile. There are people in far worse
conditions like Helen Keller, the blind, those suffering from cancer, imagine if all of them
got mean and pouty. There are many who grow up as orphans, and yet deal with their
issues and move on. We must OWN responsibility for our behavior and actions.
*******************
COMPLACENCY
As long as they could go to dance bars and hold hands on campus, hey, well, ah,
everything was okay, they kept repeating.
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they cringe – these uptight middleclass homosexuals – in stylishly decored, ferned homes
– at the thought of street sex
Complacency and indifference about our own are among the ugliest aspects of the gay
world.
This goes back to that saying:
"In Germany, they came first for the Communists, And I didn’t speak up because I
wasn’t a Communist;
And then they came for the trade unionists, And I didn’t speak up because I wasn’t
a trade unionist;
And then they came for the Jews, And I didn’t speak up because I wasn’t a Jew;
And then . . . they came for me . . . And by that time there was no one left to speak
up."
The first statement indicates that we have limited the meaning of gay to the shallow
holding of hands and going to bars.
The second reminds me of the above saying and the fact that we are as judgmental as
others. Sure, street sex is no proper behavior, but did not the gay community emerge
from that and must take responsibility to help others out of it?
*******************
INTEGRATION
Two cops invade a gay area to bust two men – and other gays often watch as if at a circus
– making no protest.
This reminds me of my friends and I one evening on our way to Buddy’s. I brought up the
idea of going to the Druids and they mentioned the prospect of being beaten up. I stated
boldly we’ll do the ‘Tarzan Boy’ call and our brothers across the street will rush to our
aid. Upon hearing that my friend amusingly said, ‘only to come see us beaten up as a
circus’
I think we need to be responsible and able part of the society. There is a time to rebel and
a time to be active members in society. Imagine if we had gay cops, gay ministers and the
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like, surely that does influence societal norms, step by step, person by person, and
institution by institution.
While the author writes as follows that nobody would help in seeing cops bust two men,
he should be mindful that by not allowing for gay people to be cops to be instrumental in
change, is he not perpetuating victimhood?
Join the army? Become cops! Support the rancid institutions that have slaughtered us?
Join the churches that have crucified us?
*******************
LOVE ONE ANOTHER
Attracted to each other, we often turn away in fear. We have intimate relations one
moment and the next day we’ll cross the street to avoid each other, in fear.
We know lust and its manifestation thrilling sex, yet we have not the patience,
commitment, sacrifice, compromise, the giving without expecting anything in return, all
of which constitute love. Love, that looks beyond bellies, birthmarks, acne and scars, that
goes beyond masculine or feminine, good looking or not so good looking, old or young. It
is love that is missing. That one phrase which cost a Rabbi his life 2000 years ago!