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Re: Frank Talk on Gay Stereotypes
At 09:49 PM 3/18/97 -0800, Anonymous Poster wrote:
>I have a negative image when it comes to portraying gay men. I look down
>on gay men and their behaviors/activities. I think that they are selfish
>and DESPERATE. Many examples come to mind:
I would like to thank you for this frank and candid posting. It's all too
prevalent in our little community to take the attitude that any behavior
associated with being gay is axiomatically Right and that the rest of us
are obliged to defend it. And if we find fault with any such behavior,
however deviant or repellant, we are ostracized, marginalized, and the word
"judgmental" gets used as often as "the" gets used in normal speech.
I'm a gay man. I despise the gay community. I have as little to do with
it as possible. Before you start typing out "internalized homophobia," let
me observe that I never heard an anti-gay remark from anyone whose opinion
I respected before I came out; in my first few months I embraced the
community and the freedom, and it was AFTER exposure that I developed the
revulsion I feel now.
>1) Gay men lack self-respect and respect for other gay men. I've seen
>many instances when a guy will be approached once his date/boyfriend
>leaves to go to the bathroom or to buy a drink. This shows cowardice,
>shamelessness, and desperation. I see this and I think, "Have some
>self-respect." or, "Why don't you go find your own boyfriend?!?"
There is a definite trend among some gay men to seek to break apart others'
relationships. For these kind of men (I observe this most often in
Scandinavian men), there s an element of victory in prying apart two
lovers. I am recently the victim of just such a man.
But going back to the generality of self-respect; I agree whole-heartedly.
So many gays feel obliged to live up to the societal expectation that we
are all fruits, fairies, or deviates and lower themselves to be just that.
I think that this self-degradation peaks in the whole leather/bear thing,
where we glorify men who don't take care of themselves or who are as
conformist as girls in a Catholic elementary school.
>2) The community exists on a constant feeding frenzy - mostly on its
>young. Nuturing does not exists and is not even promoted. Young gay men
>have no one to look up to and they are usually befriended for sex. I
>believe the elder should act responsibly to set an example for the
>younger gay generation, to use their experience and knowledge to educate
>and advice.
And the worst offense in this department is the Rice Queen. I am a
Caucasian who dates Asian men, and I treat my dates with respect and
dignity and equality. But I follow very often in the footsteps of other
Caucasians who take advantage of the self-effacing elements of the Asian
mentality to humiliate, dominate, blackmail, rape, and subjugate the men
who are supposed to be their lovers. I know more gay Asians who have been
raped than haven't. It makes me frankly defensive, because by admitting
that I am white and a top and interested only in Asians has an implication
that I am in the same category as those shamelessly manipulative and
predatory men.
>3) Gay Pride Parade: Guys walking around exposing their crotches and
>bare ass, and the most popular booths are ones of penis-enlarging pumps
>and leather whips. Is that something to be proud of?
I call them Slime Parades. It's noteworthy that the majority of visual
anti-gay propaganda comes from these displays of depravity, and I know many
gays who come away from the parades feeling sick and exhausted.
I maintain that we bear a lot of the responsibility for our own bad
reputations. Yes there are historical prejudices and living religious
ones, but anyone who has not made up his mind about us yet who sees men
walking around in bondage gear and handcuffs and leather is not about to
write his congressman in support of gay rights.
The fact is, most of us are "normal-acting" people who just want to make
ends meet, find a place for ourselves in the world and someone to share out
lives with. Yet we are called upon by some twisted notion of solidarity to
endorse "open relationships," "threesomes," depraved behavior, and the
antics of people who use being gay to get attention.
>Who am I to say this? I'm a 26yo, gay Vietnamese guy who came out at the
>age of 14. I was raised with traditional values and I'll stick by them
>to the very end. It's interesting to read some of the petty and
>irrelevant things that are said on here (like someone whining about
>having to read about a LA posting) - it makes me wonder how some of us
>set our priorities.
I thank you for this letter and support you in your adherence to your
values. I believe in monogamy and while I concede others the right to live
otherwise, they're not welcome at my home. I am proud to be gay but I am
not proud of a community that revels in slime and has no higher political
aspirations than keeping the bathhouses open.
Chris Fox
=============================================
"When a man lies, he murders part of the world"
-- Merlin
"When the unreal is taken for the real, the real becomes unreal."
-- Tsao Hsueh-chin, Dream of the Red Chamber
"The problem with the wise is they are
so filled with doubts while the dull are so certain."
-- Bertrand Russell
"Nevertheless, it moves"
-- Galileo, responding to the Inquisition order that he recant his
observation that the earth moves about the sun
=============================================
Chris Fox
Woodinville, WA USA
Senior Software Consultant
One return per function
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