The Oct. 3 Time magazine cover story, The
Battle Over Gay Teens (sorry, must be a Time subscriber to read
it all) has some interesting observations. Among them:
[Ritch Savin-Williams, who chairs Cornell's human-development department] recalls counseling a kid who, after the third session, referred to his "partner." "And I said, 'Oh, you're gay.' And he said, 'No. I only fall in love with guys, but I'm not "gay." It doesn't have anything to do with me.' He saw being gay as leftist, radical. ...
The political part is what worries [Michael Glatze, editor of YGA Magazine]. "I don't think the gay movement understands the extent to which the next generation just wants to be normal kids. The people who are getting that are the Christian right," he says. Indeed, several of those I met at the Exodus event had come not because they thought it would make them straight or even because they are particularly fervent Christians. Instead, they were there because they find something empty about gay culture-a feeling that Exodus exploits with frequent declamations about gays' supposed promiscuity and intemperance. ...
On the first day of the Point Foundation's [scholarships for gay youth] retreat...the 38 students who made the trip were given gift bags that contained, among other items: ...a DVD of the 2001 film Hedwig and the Angry Inch, in which a teenage boy is masturbated by an adult. ... The Aug. 16 issue of the gay magazine the Advocate, whose cover featured a shirtless man and blared, summer sex issue. ...
Point executive director Vance Lancaster says the film, a cult musical about the relationship between a drag queen and a young singer, was already a favorite for many scholars. He also says it "reflects reality". ...
Point scholar and Emory College junior Bryan Olsen, who turned 21 in August and has been out since he was 15, told me during the retreat, "It probably sounds anti-gay, but I think there are very few age-appropriate gay activities for a 14-, 15-year-old. There's no roller skating, bowling or any of that kind of thing. It's Internet, gay porn, gay chats."
Food for thought.