Not long ago, the "family values" crowd thought the best way to oppose gay rights was to slander gay people. To them, being gay was synonymous with behavior that was objectionable, anti-social or illegal. Republican politicians insisted that marriage had to be "defended" from gay couples. Paul Cameron, a "psychologist" whose junk science is still a staple of right-wing Web sites, has written that gay people are "sexual bums" who suffer from a "preoccupation with sex" and "seek excessive distraction" through sex, drugs and other risk-taking behaviors.
The political argument that followed from this picture was simple and insidious: Why should these people be allowed to marry one another, or be protected against hate crimes or job discrimination?
But lately, it seems, Republicans and the religious right have stumbled onto something even more deviously effective. Rather than talking about icky behavior, they are modeling icky behavior, and forcing the rest of us to talk about it. Their antics practically guarantee that the media will discuss homosexuality in the same breath as pedophilia, prostitution and anonymous sexual encounters. This is an evil-genius political strategy worthy of Karl Rove.
Consider:
• Sen. Larry Craig, the Idaho Republican with a 100 percent rating from the American Family Association, unwittingly plays footsy with a cop, gets himself arrested, then goes on television to indignantly declare, "I am not gay!" The impression many Americans get: being gay means picking up men in bathrooms.
• Mark Foley, the former Florida Republican congressman, gets caught having racy online chats with teenage males, resigns from Congress, then blames his behavior on a drinking problem and checks into rehab. The message: gay men are pedophiles, and they deal with their messy, embarrassing lives by turning to alcohol. At best, they're to be pitied. At worst, they're creepy criminals.
• Ted Haggard, the evangelical minister disgraced by allegations by a male prostitute about illicit sex and methamphetamine use, undergoes religious "therapy" and is subsequently pronounced "completely heterosexual." The message: being gay is an illness that causes you to do drugs and hang out with hustlers.
The truth is that these behaviors are not about being gay (any more than Sen. David Vitter's patronage of the D.C. Madam was about being straight). If anything, they are about being closeted and repressed - conditions that Republicans and many churches have encouraged by treating homosexuality as a source of shame rather than a normal human variation.
Through their bumbling and hypocrisy, Haggard, Foley and Craig have not only disgraced themselves, they have inflamed old stereotypes - stereotypes that were being rapidly discarded as more and more gay people came out and shared the realities of their respectable, everyday lives with families and friends.
Now it may be that much more difficult for these same gay citizens to have an informed, rational dialogue with their fellow Americans about legitimate political and legal issues. Even if many Americans have shed old ideas and become more comfortable with homosexuality, will the media give equal time to sober debates about equal marriage rights, hate crimes legislation and job discrimination? Unlikely.
The more they're told about boys, bathrooms and prostitutes, the less Americans will learn about the real lives of their gay neighbors and co-workers. That might be a windfall for anti-gay activists and wedge-issue politicians. But it's a civic and moral disaster for the rest of us.
40 Comments for “The ‘Ick’ Factor Strikes Again…and Again…”
posted by Lori Heine on
Those who believe the stereotypes themselves — and I think that people like Craig, Foley and Ted Haggard do — will tend to act out those sad, sick imagines in their minds: images they have, first and foremost, of themselves.
I really don’t think there are as many people out there (even conservative and religious people) who believe those stereotypes as there were in the past. I think most people are smarter than the Craigs, the Foleys, the Haggards and the sort of cretins they exploit for political or material gain.
Everybody with whom I have spoken about all three of these sad cases has criticized them as individuals, not as members of some “gay” segment of the population. And this has been true pretty much across the board, regardless of these people’s ideology.
All each of us can do as individuals is hold our heads up and live with the greatest possible integrity. People of goodwill are going to recognize this, and those who won’t are not people of goodwill.
I classify people who say things like, “ALL gays do such and such” the same way I do those who say “ALL black people do this,” or “ALL Hispanics do that,” or “well, you know how ALL women are.”
There will always be people like those. In their ignorant judgmentalism, they’re saying a lot more about themselves than they are about those they are attempting to disparage.
posted by Rhywun on
What a cynical article. Cheer up, Steve, it’s not that bad.
You have to pity folks like Craig more than anything. “Coming out” was never really an option for them, and I think most intelligent people in America know that and see their actions in that light. But it’s the people you don’t read about in the paper who make the difference anyway: the brother, the coworker, the friend. Those people are far more influential than some senator halfway across the country.
posted by JohnJ on
I think it’s different this time. People are now familiar with the lengths gay people will go to get married – who didn’t see the pitiful sight of middle-class couples standing in the rain for hours-on-end several years ago in San Francisco in the hopes of getting a license that was almost certainly going to be invalidated by the courts? And what marginally reasonable person could imagine that men like Craig and Haggard, enjoying all the honors and affluence our rich society has to bestow upon a person, would risk it all for a sudden deranged choice to be homosexual?
posted by Charles Wilson on
When it comes to desperate sex, I think the public at large sees what’s happening: The people who get nabbed for this stuff are invariably closeted, moralistic, hypocritical Republicans. I don’t think well-adjusted gay people have anything to fear. It’s the Independent Gay Wingnut Closet Cases who have to worry.
posted by Michigan-Matt on
Charles, you’ve been drinking that anti-GOP KoolAid so long, you don’t even think before spouting an opinion anymore. I think you need to stop attending the AlGoreN’8 meetings… the mindset there is rubbing off on you in a baaad way.
Sex in quasi-public settings like mens’ rooms, public showers, the sauna or in a sweaty throng on the dancefloor are decidedly gay-centered activities to most mature, responsible adults. These are activities that gay writers widely fantasize about, porn producers incorporate into gay films and occupy the fancy of the majority of young gay men until the hormones settle down a bit.
Are Boy George or Michael George or Michael Jackson “invariably closeted, moralistic, hypocritical” GOPers? I think not. And yet, all three of them could serve as GayLiberalPosterBoi of the month… not Larry Craig or Haggart or Foley.
When our community sees Craig as a tool to bash GOPers –like many here have done and do regularly– it requires those bashers to subvert reality, express an opinion that rejects credibility and perpetuates the notion that gays are witless, guilble pawns in the hands of Democrat Masters.
Good job Charles; ScreaminHowieDean has your biscuit backstage.
posted by ColoradoPatriot on
MM: “…occupy the fancy of the majority of young gay men until the hormones settle down a bit.”
Speak for yourself. Your post is really creepy and angry. Why is that?
posted by Jimbo on
I agree with the first commenter. Times have changed. The overwhelming majority of gays don’t have to worry about the public taking a dim view of us as a result of these “sexcapades”. Enough gays are out of the closet to refute any of these claims. Give Americans some credit; they’re not the mindless lemmings you make them out to be.
Michigan Matt: Boy George & George Michael (not Michael George) have come out of the closet; but to my knowledge, Michael Jackson hasn’t yet. I hope he never does (yeech!). Incidentally, how come I never see your comments over at Gay Patriot anymore?
posted by Brian Miller on
Sex in quasi-public settings like mens’ rooms, public showers, the sauna or in a sweaty throng on the dancefloor are decidedly gay-centered activities to most mature, responsible adults. These are activities that gay writers widely fantasize about, porn producers incorporate into gay films and occupy the fancy of the majority of young gay men until the hormones settle down a bit.
This is such a load of crap, without any empirical basis, I don’t know where to begin.
Perhaps I’ll just address the most substantive contention, which is that people’s perception of sexuality is driven by porn and the media.
Well, to an extent that’s true. However, gay porn isn’t a heterosexual staple, so you can scratch all those dirty fantasies off the list of “influencers.” (And ditto for gay people viewing straight porn BTW).
And advertising/media/popular culture? Don’t insult intelligence please — if we believed everything the media communicated about sexuality as gospel truth, we’d be waiting for our promised erotic experience from popping open a particular brand of beer or test driving a certain brand of sports coupe.
The reality is that people form their opinions of gay people from their most personalized experience. Just as I know that most of the FOX News ranting about Arabs is racist drivel after befriending many Arab people, the average American knows most of the ranting about gay people is homophobic drivel after befriending or working with gay people. In that regard, Steve and Lori are spot-on-target.
posted by Herb Spencer on
CP, M-M specifically stated he was speaking not of ALL, but of “the majority of young gay men.” That needn’t include you, me or 49.99% of young gay men, but I think his comments are right on. To deny that is right up there with mouthing the old “AIDS is NOT a gay disease!” mantra. Not that you get it because you’re gay, of course, but that it raged for too long in “the gay ‘community'” because of the mindless promiscuity that too many of us – young, old and in-between – engaged and, unfortunately, continue to engage in today.
BM, you forget that there are still those among us – they’re usually young gay lawyers, whose legal theories rage as much as their hormones – who continue to argue that bathhouses are “protected spaces” for purposes of the “protected speech” that goes on inside them. How one can accept that argument without gagging is beyond me, especially since the activities that occur there, in locker rooms and on the dance floors of gay bars and circuit parties are by definition “gay centered activities.” To deny that is a poor policy indeed, not just because it flies in the face of reason, but because it rightly marks us as in denial and incapable, like gentler Muslims afraid to rein in their more violent brethren, of putting responsibility for the harm caused where it belongs.
posted by Michigan-Matt on
Colorado”Patriot”, ummm. I would imagine if you think that to be “angry” you have some issues to deal with on the couch with your therapist. The gay culture teaches, ingrains and impresses on our youth to adopt the most liberal, left-of-center, anti-societal ‘tudes and act on every impulse before their youth is lost. It’s in our advertising. It’s in our lifestyle. You can play ostrich and ignore it –but you can’t deny it.
Creepy? Now what’s creepy is aging queens like you that advocate a lifestyle intent on devouring our gay youth with counter-societal messages and you can’t resist doing it… over and over.
Now, that’s creepy. Right up there with the porn producers who cater to youth-deprived aging queens like you, Colorado”Patriot”. Why is that?
posted by Michigan-Matt on
BM writes: “The reality is that people form their opinions of gay people from their most personalized experience.”
Ummm, that’s such a load of crap, without any empirical basis, I don’t know where to begin –to quote you.
If you really think that’s true… Michigan’s vote to deny gay marriage was approved 61-39% so that means a whole lot of folks haven’t had good experiences with f2f gay couples, eh? And the other 10 states who enacted similar provisions before Michigan? I think Michigan was #11. Craig’s story resonates with most Americans because it plays to their impression about gay men… lurking in parks, seeking out anonymous sex (thanks AndieSullivan) and it’s why we have to scream “pedophile doesn’t equal gay” everytime another one is caught molesting and raping young boys.
What a load of crap you offer, Brian. Most people form their opinions about gays without ever having met one… from a distance… from advertising… from depictions in movies like BB… from “gay trends” like bug chasing and PrideParades.
It’s why we need to police our own community and get some restraint on the liberalists in our midst before we’ll get credibility on MainStreet.
posted by Charles Wilson on
Sex in quasi-public settings like mens’ rooms, public showers, the sauna or in a sweaty throng on the dancefloor are decidedly gay-centered activities to most mature, responsible adults. These are activities that gay writers widely fantasize about, porn producers incorporate into gay films and occupy the fancy of the majority of young gay men until the hormones settle down a bit.
A porn fantasy is only a porn fantasy, except maybe for the straight soldiers who decided to act their porn fantasies out in Abu Ghraib and other U.S. military facilities throughout Iraq, Afghanistan, and in Cuba.
In real life, I’m sure there is a cohort of overtly gay people who practice compulsive sex in public places. There is a cohort of straight people who do the same thing. But these are the exceptions to the rule, as it concerns “mainstream” gay people, by which I mean those who aren’t closeted.
Any serious examination of the T-room subculture will yield the truth that the vast majority of the regulars are compulsive, damaged closet cases, which these days means your typical married, conservative Republican hypocrite. Yup, every now and then there’ll be a married Democrat in the mix, but the exception only proves the rule.
Don’t sit there and expect me to answer for Larry Craig, Ted Haggard, Matt Sanchez and all the rest. If the Log Cabinettes feel like actually doing a service to gay people one of these decades, they’ll demand that their closeted officeholders show some personal courage and responsibility and come out of the closet.
Meantime, I’m not worrying all that much about the general public. I think most of them get it.
posted by ColoradoPatriot on
MM: “The gay culture teaches, ingrains and impresses on our youth to adopt the most liberal, left-of-center, anti-societal ‘tudes and act on every impulse before their youth is lost.”
Nope, nothing creepy and angry about that. [sarcasm off]
MM, do you even read what you write? Your posts here are nothing more than delusional rants sprinkled through with derogatory insults. It is nice that you think that I’m an “aging queen” who preys on young gays (I’m 29, masculine/bear-ish and have been in a monogamous relationship for the last 5 years)…I guess I just project an “aging queen” vibe. But my personal stats aside…you are really creepy and angry. Please seek help.
posted by JakeMountain on
Michigan-Matt, if I understand the thrust of your comments, what you are saying is that the real “ick” and revulsion should to be reserved for the conduct of gays who engage in base activities that give all gays a bad rep with average Americans –your Main Street reference. The pride parade extremes, the bathouses, the public lurking for sex, the corruption and violation of youth, circuit parties and I would add the self-centered role of lust and sexual explotation of others in gays.
I agree. I also applaud your willingness to tell some of the rabid Democratic Party activists here that the big, bad evil boogeyman isn’t always the conservatives, the Republicans, the gay conservatives or even President Bush. But your choice will always set you up for brickbats from the gay liberal Democratic Party apologists. At least they didn’t compare you to a “Jew helping the Nazi concentration camp commandant”.
If that means I need to get a therapist (never had one, thank you very much) with a couch to be reeducated and indoctrinated into the gay liberal mindset, don’t bother.
ColoradoPatriot, you appear to do a fair job of hurling insults and jibjabs at commenters –maybe you can’t see that because your mirror is fogged up from your own the steamy rhetoric? You would do well to practice civility. Just my opinion.
posted by Jason on
“It’s why we need to police our own community and get some restraint on the liberalists in our midst before we’ll get credibility on MainStreet.”
Great idea, how do you plan on implementing this?
Now here’s four things that might actually help —
-All the butch, masculine, blue-collar, regular-guys need to Come Out of the closet. They need their own float in the Parade complete with beer and NASCAR. They don’t need to change who they are, they just need to go public. Too many are content to complain that there’s no place for them, and get caught up in a meaningless debate on labels. You’re in charge of your own visibility. The only reason screaming queens get all the attention is because they are standing up and speaking out.
-The Constitution and Bill of Rights guarantee freedom of speech, association, life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness. We need to remind people that those words include the things and people they like, and also the things and people they don’t like. They don’t have to like us. They can hate us all they want, but our founding documents mean that the government can’t take sides and treat us differently without a very very good reason. And there isn’t one.
-We need to counter lies, distortions, misleading statements whenever and wherever they occur. I’m talking about all those surveys that the RR uses to villify us. People need the truth, that there is absolutely nothing wrong with being gay. There are certainly messed up gay people, but there are plenty of messed up straight people, too. It’s one thing to have an opinion, it is quite another to try to back that opinion up with false data.
-We need to stop letting people frame the debate as a gay issue every time some stupid gay person does some ridiculous thing. So what if Craig and fifteen hundred other closet cases like to get off in tea-rooms? That doesn’t make it a gay issue. He was also white, is this a white issue, too? Nothing about being gay or having sex with a man requires you to be in or near a bathroom stall. Straights have sex in inappropriate locales as well.
posted by ColoradoPatriot on
Jason: “Straights have sex in inappropriate locales as well.”
For the record, Denver has 2 gay bathhouses and (at least) 4 straight swingers clubs.
posted by ETJB on
I do feel that the closet explains, in part, the cause of some of this self-destructive behavior. Even if a Senator was not going to have sex in public, he was certainly looking for it from a total stranger — not the ideal choice for anyone (gay or straight).
Yet, how public figures can expect to remain in the closet is beyond me. We are an era when a sneeze by Paris Hilton is treated as 24/7 news. Where anyone with a blogger or web page can call him or herself a journalist.
If such people wish to remain in the closet, they going to have to stay under a 24/7/entertainment is news/online/wikipedia/photo cell phones/era. Not an easy task
posted by Brian Miller on
If you really think that’s true… Michigan’s vote to deny gay marriage was approved 61-39% so that means a whole lot of folks haven’t had good experiences with f2f gay couples, eh?
That’s just an indication of the lack of the importance of the question to most Michiganders, who likely sat out the election entirely — if the voting turnout was equivalent to the national average.
The other problem is that you’re picking and choosing your regions. There are no more gay couples in Massachusetts, Connecticut or New Jersey than Michigan, but all three of those states had very different electoral results vis-a-vis gay marriage (and higher turnouts than Michigan, interestingly enough).
posted by Brian Miller on
Most people form their opinions about gays without ever having met one…
This one really cracks me up, but it also underscores the importance of being “out.”
EVERY American has met “a gay,” and every American has a gay person in their everyday lives, either as part of their families, in their workplace, as a neighbor, etc.
They might not KNOW it, but that doesn’t change the fact that they do. And statistics show that people who actually know someone who is gay (and know that person is gay) are more favorable to gay people in general.
The “solution” isn’t to demand less gay culture in the media — the solution is to be out (and encourage other people to be out). It’s a lot harder to be an anti-gay idiot when your best employee, top customer, friendly neighbor or son/brother is gay.
Frankly, I’m surprised I’m even making this point — your argument is straight (har har) out of the late 70s/early 80s.
posted by Brian Miller on
We need to stop letting people frame the debate as a gay issue every time some stupid gay person does some ridiculous thing.
Good point. The fact that this happens so often underscores the fact that it’s not only the left wing of the polity that is trying to push us into “groupthink” — the right wing is all too eager to demand that gay people “explain” the stupid behavior of other gay people.
I usually counter that by demanding that the person making the complaint (who is usually a heterosexual mother) defend the behavior of fellow heterosexual mother (and child murderer) Susan Smith, or explain the behavior of heterosexual Paris Hilton.
posted by HC on
In our covert investigation conducted at Victory Christian Center (VCC) in Austin, TX, we collected mounting evidence of how the Republican political strategy is employed from the Bush/Rove White House on down to their base of conservative Evangelical churches.
David Barton, Vice-chairman of the Texas GOP and founder of an organization called Wallbuilders, was invited to be the guest speaker at both of VCC’s Sunday morning worship services on August 20, 2006. According to Pastor Lee Boss’ introduction of David Barton to the congregation, he’s “been used by God to touch more elected officials in this nation over any other organization.” Armed with old-time bibles, a swanky PowerPoint presentation, and much jibber-jabber, Barton mobilizes the Evangelical Christians to the polls by replacing the word “voting” with “stewardship”. He concludes by telling us that Republican political candidates are the obvious choice in our stewardship if we are concerned with biblical issues.
Karl Rove understands the conservative Evangelical voices are a powerful and very well organized tax exempt, money making machine for the Republican party. As long as these Evangelical church leaders have an insatiable appetite for power and influence, Rove will continue to use them to succeed on his mission of establishing a permanent Republican majority. Watch how all the Republican Presidential candidates are scrambling in a tizzy to court the Evangelical / Religious Right vote. It’s funny to see the conservatives salivating at the bit, waiting for the next self-righteous politician with the right outside package that they can rally behind. Ever notice how the GOP have to beat up on a minority group of people in order to rally their base? How Christian or Christ-like is that?
FaithoftheAbomination.com
posted by Michigan-Matt on
Brian writes: “That’s just an indication of the lack of the importance of the question to most Michiganders, who likely sat out the election entirely….”
Sorry, Brian, voter turnout on that national election date in Nov 2004 was high in Michigan… about 64% of registered voters and roughly 50% of the state’s entire citizen population. Kerry carried the state –so there must be a lot of anti-gay Democrats running around in Michigan.
The Marriage Ban Proposal in 2004 is generally assessed here as a backlash against the harsh civil rights/victimhood rhetoric and adverse image that gays have in Michigan… that, and the fact that our supposed allies in the Democrat Party sat on their butts and wouldn’t help advance gay civil rights when it was needed most. Dem Prez candidate Kerry, btw, supported Proposal 2 (the marriage ban) in one of his last campaign visits to Michigan.
Nice guy.
And thanks Jake.
posted by Michigan-Matt on
Brian writes: “Frankly, I’m surprised I’m even making this point — your argument is straight (har har) out of the late 70s/early 80s”
Nice dodge; almost as good as the one where you contend a 64% voter turnout rate and passage of a constitutional amendment by 61-39%. Was that last slam an attempt to revoke my gaycard? How very GayLeft of you, Mr Libertarian.
Sorry, Brian, the last polling was a Pew Poll 5 months ago that indicates only about 40% of Americans have either a close friend or family member who is gay.
And the opinion isn’t favorable on issues like gay adoption, gay marriage and the validity of gay sting operations against public indecency.
But good try, again. Don’t let the facts get in your way when trying to discredit a credible argument.
posted by ColoradoPatriot on
MM: “Sorry, Brian, the last polling was a Pew Poll 5 months ago that indicates only about 40% of Americans have either a close friend or family member who is gay.”
Brian has made no specific claims about Americans being related to or being “close friends” with gays, just that most Americans have some sort of connection with homosexuals. You are purposely misstating what he wrote. Do you think that is a good way to win an argument?
Answer: It is not.
posted by Brian Miller on
voter turnout on that national election date in Nov 2004 was high in Michigan… about 64% of registered voters and roughly 50% of the state’s entire citizen population.
Which means that about 30% of Michigan’s adult population cared enough about homophobia to support it in law. That’s not exactly a resounding success for anti-gay people, nor an insurmountable obstacle to overcome for gay activists who seek to embrace an agenda that respects political and sociological diversity in our own community.
Was that last slam an attempt to revoke my gaycard? How very GayLeft of you, Mr Libertarian.
What’s up with conservatards accusing everyone who deigns to disagree, by citing historical fact, as “leftists?” How dumb.
the last polling was a Pew Poll 5 months ago that indicates only about 40% of Americans have either a close friend or family member who is gay.
Yes, and those aren’t the only categories that I mentioned. You completely ignored my two points, which were that:
1) 100% of Americans have a family member who is gay — they simply don’t realize it since the family member is closeted;
2) Close friends and family are only two categories. There’s also neighbors, “standard” friends, colleagues, and other folks with whom a collegial relationship exists.
Your continual attempts to ignore these two points don’t make you “conservative” or me “left.” They just make you obtuse and focused on defeatism rather than an empirical view of the overall situation.
I understand that said gloomy perspective is necessary in order for you to blame every gay person who isn’t like you for homophobia, but your case is weaker than Barbara Mikulski’s sex appeal.
posted by Lori Heine on
“I understand that said gloomy perspective is necessary in order for you to blame every gay person who isn’t like you for homophobia, but your case is weaker than Barbara Mikulski’s sex appeal.”
Brian, I absolutely agree. Nobody denies that even gay people have the right to be conservative if they want to, but really, enough is enough.
The energizer-battery-on-the-shoulder combativeness of many gay conservatives is really getting absurd. Where, exactly, ARE all these snarling homophobes who blame all of us for bathroom-prowlers and Tinkerbell popping out of the cake at Pride? I honestly don’t know, because I only very rarely see them. Usually people who think like this are simply stupid. If they didn’t have one reason to hate us, they’d just scrounge however hard they had to to find another.
“What’s up with conservatards accusing everyone who deigns to disagree, by citing historical fact, as ‘leftists?’ How dumb.
I really don’t know what’s up with these people. And if the only fallout from such idiocy was that they couldn’t get dates with gay liberals, I suppose that wouldn’t be much of a loss. The really sad thing about it is that the Right-Wingers they’re always doing triple-backflips trying to impress really don’t give a damn.
posted by Michigan-Matt on
Brian, sorry the demerit points for you are sticking even if you try to wiggle out of those unsupportable, indefensible and nonsensical comments.
Let’s take one: “100% of Americans have a family member who is gay” –is there even a logical explanation for that claim? I have close friends who clearly do NOT have gay family members… unless you include ancestors or extend it to 5th cousins in the mix. Everyone has a family member who is a gay –they just don’t know it?? Take off the tinfoil hat there, cowboy.
And this one: reducing the Nov 04 ballot on Prop 2 to pure nonsense, you write “Which means that about 30% of Michigan’s adult population cared enough about homophobia to support it in law.” I know you libertarians like to argue that voters not going to the polls ought to be somehow considered a vote for the status quo… but in Michigan, 7 weeks out from election, polling was indicating the Prop2 was going to pass by as much as 3:1… widely reported, widely agreed by pundits. So I guess all those folks who didn’t vote in the election can, by that quirky but cute Libertarian logic, be considered a pro-Marriage Ban voters and supportive of the majority ’cause they knew where it was headed??? I’m telling you, there’s a real good good reason why Libertarians DONT win elections… with thinking like your’s.
You’re dodging more than a pack of Democrats, Brian. You offered that average Americans get their opinioned informed by firsthand knowledge of gays… I say no; it’s indirect. It’s media… it’s poster boy darlings like George Michael, Boy George, Michael Jackson, Mike Rogers and now Perez Hilton…gheez, can we lower the standard any farther?
My opinion is informed by data. Yours is just coming from your hipster 6 shooter. Put the cap gun away if you can’t discuss this topic with credibility, ok? Pew has it that people don’t rely on first hand, intimate f2f contact with gays to inform their opinions –ergo, we need to take better care to correct America’s impression of what is gay and renovate our image as a collective community.
———————————-
(btw… weren’t you the one who said Cheney flipflopped on FMA just before the election in 06?)
posted by Michigan-Matt on
PrincessLori writes: “…blame all of us for bathroom-prowlers and Tinkerbell popping out of the cake at Pride? I honestly don’t know, because I only very rarely see them.”
I think you need to get out of Kansas, Princess. Take a hop on nearly any website with PrideParade pictures and you’ll see Tinkerbell flying far outside the Disney Castle’s airspace.
And then you write: “Usually people who think like this are simply stupid. If they didn’t have one reason to hate us, they’d just scrounge however hard they had to to find another”
Really? I guess you weren’t watching the high and immediate level of disgust expressed when Craig’s bathroom antics came to light? Or how about the ever present false pedophile suspicion that seems to lurk under the surface whenever gay men are in an authority position over male children? Ask an average American to name a serial killer and it’s likely to be Gacey or Dahmer or ask a Brit and it’s Wm Beggs… who now has a civil union with his imprisoned boyfriend.
Right, those “stupid” people you claim to Brian will hate gays no matter what… for the benefit of gays everywhere, don’t take any PR jobs advocating for our side, ok? We’ve got enough trouble already gaining credibility with non-gays.
posted by Lori Heine on
“Princess” Lori?
Who is this bitter, petty little person, anyway?
Princess my ass. Just because there is a “high and immediate level of disgust” when someone like Larry Craig tries to play pitty-pat with a cop in a bathroom, that hardly means everyone in Righteous Hetero America is going to blame all gays.
Get thee back to your own tiara, Princess. And while you’re at it, keep on doing the gay-bashers dirty work for them.
Another pathetic case.
posted by Michigan-Matt on
PrincessLori, maybe at some point logic will return and you’ll make some sense. I wasn’t the one who tossed out the lunacy that you can’t find any snarling homophobes out there –there are lots of ’em Princess– you were advancing that notion.
Nope, the answer doesn’t lie in how far into the sand you can stick your tiara and boa and head on that issue, the answer lies in indepedent, moderate and progressive gays taking back their community and tossing the radical, extremists from our midst… making it clear that their values areNOT the gay community’s values.
Go ahead and keep your tiara, boa, and head buried in the sand. I’ve gathered you’re more interested in defending the power of the GayLeft democrat apologists and not the long term interests of gays.
It’s a shame that the only thing you seemed to learn from life is how to be exclusively intolerant… but victimhood teaches that lesson as a defense first.
posted by Lori Heine on
Princess Matt, you are an ignorant little son of a bitch.
You know nothing about me, and you’re talking out of your ass. All the drama-queen comments about “Princess” this and that may be quite a good means of entertaining yourself, but make sure you keep that sort of crap in cyberspace. If you ever make the mistake of doing that in person, to me or almost any other 45-year-old dyke, you’ll be picking that tiara out of your teeth.
My point, you pretentious, arrogant little pimple-faced fool, was that in our everyday lives, most of the people we know have better sense than to think Larry Craig or Ted Haggard is JUST like us.
At least the people in my life are. No telling what sort of damned fools you have in yours.
Say it in person next time, you coward. Pull your feather boa out of your ass and learn a few manners. I don’t know you, so don’t go getting an attitude with me.
Thank God I don’t know you. What an asshole.
posted by Brian Miller on
Let’s take one: “100% of Americans have a family member who is gay” –is there even a logical explanation for that claim? I have close friends who clearly do NOT have gay family members… unless you include ancestors or extend it to 5th cousins in the mix.
No, you have friends who don’t know that one of their family members is gay. They have the aunt who was “too busy taking care of mother to marry,” or the eccentric uncle who never had time for a wife, or the son who went off to a new job in San Francisco (and hasn’t brought his boyfriend home yet).
I know you libertarians like to argue that voters not going to the polls ought to be somehow considered a vote for the status quo
When the turnout is not a supermajority, and the thinnest majority of those who did show choose to embrace bigotry — with MORE people not caring about the issue enough to vote at all — I certainly consider that to be far from the doom-and-gloom picture you keep painting, yes.
I’m sorry that this removes your victimhood status from you and instead empowers you to get what you want through hard work, but I’m just a bitchy libertarian that way. If you don’t like your circumstances, change them, instead of acting all helpless and blaming someone else for all the problems stemming from your laziness.
In that regard, you’re no different from the “gayleft” sorts you constantly decry. . . “Oh, the world is soooo unfair because of *them*! Honor me as a victim! Take responsibility for my unwillingness to work hard! It’s just too hard to see the forest for the trees, I just can’t do it! And it’s all your fault!”
Honestly.
correct America’s impression of what is gay
Frankly, if America’s impression of what is gay was measured by the actions of boring finger-pointing anonymous sorts like yourself, I’d be more mortified than with the present status quo.
in our everyday lives, most of the people we know have better sense than to think Larry Craig or Ted Haggard is JUST like us
Or just like Michigan-Matt, for that matter.
Michigan-Matt: If it wasn’t for those NASTY gays in San Francisco and closeted members of my party, everyone would love us! This is horrible, and hopeless! I will be oppressed forever!
Everyone else: Well, then, do something about it.
MM: I can’t! My life is OVER! And it’s all their fault!
EE: It’s not as bad as you say.
MM: But it IS! It’s WORSE, you gayleftist, because I SAY SO! I cannot work against it! Homophobia is everywhere! I am a victim, a victim of the homophobia caused by those Bourbon Street drag queens! And it’s ALL YOUR FAULT! 30% of the people in my state voted against gay marriage — that’s an insurmountable majority that I can never overcome! It’s hopeless! Honor my victimhood!
EE: Oh brother.
MM: You’re victimizing me! You’re victimizing me! Stop victimizing me! It’s you’re fault! Oh woe, oh woe! 50% of 60% of the entire world hates me and it’s everyone’s fault but mine!
EE: *walks quickly in the opposite direction*
MM: Come back you gay leftists! You are censoring me! This is why we’re in trouble! This is why I cannot get laid! Come back! Come back!
posted by Brian Miller on
The pride parade extremes
I was at the San Francisco Pride Parade, at the Outright Libertarians booth, and also marched in the parade itself.
Here were some of the most “extreme” things I saw:
1) Two dads with their adorable twin boys, about 3 years old.
2) Two women walking around in wedding dresses, petitioning for marriage equality.
3) Lots of lesbian moms with their kids.
4) A group of octogenarian gay and lesbian people who were telling their life stories in a special pavilion for them.
5) Delta Air Lines, offering chances to win trips around the world, as well as slap-on bracelets with their new logo affixed.
6) An extremely debauched, shocking dance display — for a *heterosexual* dance club seeking to appeal to all the straight people who showed up at pride.
7) Booths selling *extremely* high calorie food at high prices.
8) Two handsome older guys walking around in a tuxedo, getting petitions for marriage equality.
9) Lots of political organizations, including the Libertarian and Green Parties (but the Democrats and Republicans were AWOL), Outright Libertarians (but no Stonewall or Log Cabin), Lambda Legal, NGLTF, Equality California, and so on. Amazing how those gay-left Democrats just couldn’t manage to even set up a booth, despite the fact that they run all these outrageous gay events (according to the righties, anyway).
Clearly gay people have a lot to apologize for. We’re destroying the reputation of our community through such practices.
posted by JJason on
Brian,
Couldn’t agree more. Saying everyone and everything at a pride parade is just like the handful of drag queens that make the front page or the 6pm news is like saying the entire Christmas Parade is all people in Reindeer outfits. Do a Google image search “Mardi Gras”, “St. Patrick’s Day” and “4th of July” — you’ll see things that are roughly as “shocking” as what you’d see at a Pride Parade.
I get the distinct impression that those who criticize Pride Parades have yet to actually attend one. Refusing to go to a Pride Parade because you don’t want to see Leathermen and Drag Queens is like refusing to go to the Carnival because you don’t want to ride the ferris wheel. There is a hell of a lot more going on than just that.
But if you did go, you’d see drag queens. How is that any different then seeing clowns at the circus or some of the clothing in high-fashion runway shows? And you’d see leathermen, who’s outfits aren’t any more risque than your average beachwear — in fact, most of that leather covers more skin than a bikini.
In Chicago, the middle of the parade is usually about 10-15 gay-friendly religious organizations, in t-shirts and shorts. One of the local grocery store chains has this 20-foot shopping cart with a fully-clothed man sitting atop, driving it. Political Candidates, Budweiser, HIV outreach organizations, local radio stations, senators, theatres, altoids, Logo, Showtime, Comcast Cable, The local gay papers, tv stations, ATT, GLSEN, HRC, Lambda Legal all have floats and or marchers and they are usually wearing shorts and shirts.
Then, a few gay bars with funny and or slightly risque floats. Although I fail to see what’s so “extreme” about men in speedos in June. Some people act as if that hasn’t been common swimwear for the past 20-30 years! You wouldn’t think twice at seeing someone dressed like that on the beach or at a pool, or seeing a men’s diving/swimming competition on TV, so what’s the big deal? Does pavement clash with lycra?
I get so sick of this idea that the only way straight people can or will accept us is if we make ourselves less interesting than we actually are. Some people are into drag and leather, so what? Some gay men are very feminine, some lesbians are very butch, so what?
posted by Craig2 on
All this assumes that heterosexual social conservatives don’t do appalling things themselves which sideline marginal but still consensual sex in significance.
Case in point- spousal rape, or
heterosexual paedophilia. In 2005, one former leader of a right-wing Christian political party down here was found to have raped three little girls, which led to a nine year prison sentence.
posted by MIchigan-Matt on
Lori, Brian: thanks for making my case solid by example about snarling, mean-spirited drama queen gay stereotypes; you couldn’t have proven the case better even if you had used logic at some point in those rants.
Story stays on keel: most Americans do NOT have a positive image of gays (because of folks like you) or “know” someone who is gay. Larry Craig issue also does gays a disservice because the GayLeft in our crowd, operating for the Democrat Masters still on the plantation, want to use him to villify GOPers… at the expense of our gay image.
Like I said, with “friends” like that and you, how can our community every correct the excessive and extreme image gays have in the margins of the media?
Oh wait, you don’t think we have an extreme image and PR problem… we just need to out more GOPers. Ummm, right.
And the personal attacks, Princess Lori and Brian, I’ll pass on commenting –pure hate speech there. How very GayLeft of you.
posted by Lori Heine on
Stay in your little fantasy world, Matt. You obviously can’t deal with the real one.
Another pathetic little coward, hiding in cyberspace. If you’re truly representative of the “Gay Right,” then no wonder so few people take them seriously.
posted by Michigan-Matt on
Ok Princess Lori, you get a “E” for failing again to bring civility to any discussion here. Like I said, with radical antagonist dykes like you, our gay civil rights cause is hopelessly doomed. There’s no coward in this corner and when you begin to integrate yourself into a real world and society, you’ll then be able to judge what’s real and not a bit better.
Grab the PrideParade banner, Princess, and go stand with the Left freaks angry over the World Bank, American imperialism and 3rd world environmental destruction… cause you aren’t doing gays any favors.
posted by disgusted on
Jeez, you’re truly a ideologically constipated, mean-spirited dick.
Watching this thread devolve into this crap is typical of why i find this site becoming an increasingly useless waste of time.
No real discussion, no one really thinking about anything anybody else offers; just insults being hurled around like a bunch of nasty bitches. Usually by the same two or three idiots that manage to hijack everything; and the same gullible morons that take the bait.
And now including me, apparently.
IGF Administrators, some mediation? Ground rules? “Time-Outs” for the excessively rude children?
posted by Lori Heine on
“Ok Princess Lori, you get a “E” for failing again to bring civility to any discussion here.”
— And you think YOU bring civility, O Queen Matt of Michigan?
As your mother might say, “You should hear yourself.”
Out of a single comment — that I personally knew of no one so simple-minded as to tar all gays with the same brush as the likes of Larry Craig — you’ve spun your entire, fragile web of supposition, based upon nothing but ignorant and simple-minded stereotype. You really need mental help.
You know next to nothing about what I think about anything except what I have stated. But of course for an ignoramus like you, the facts are unimportant. They merely get in the way of your ideology.
Of course the “princess” seems to be a means of venting your hostility toward women who express their opinions on this board. Given reactions like yours, no wonder there aren’t more who do.
In your rantings against me, and against other people who dare to express ideas that don’t fit into your cozy little worldview, you say very little about us — and volumes about yourself.
Of course you wouldn’t listen to your mother if she said “You should hear yourself.” She’s a woman — so you must automatically lump her in with all the godless commies you hate.