From The Atlantic, an interesting take on what gay and lesbian couples teach straight ones about living in harmony:
But what if the critics are correct, just not in the way they suppose? What if same-sex marriage does change marriage, but primarily for the better? For one thing, there is reason to think that, rather than making marriage more fragile, the boom of publicity around same-sex weddings could awaken among heterosexuals a new interest in the institution, at least for a time. But the larger change might be this: by providing a new model of how two people can live together equitably, same-sex marriage could help haul matrimony more fully into the 21st century.
I like the fact that this is not a knee-jerk anti-gender but women are better piece. Writer Liza Mundy takes note that “gay marriage can function as a controlled experiment, helping us see which aspects of marital difficulty are truly rooted in gender and which are not.” And among her rules for a happy marriage, “When it comes to parenting, a 50-50 split isn’t necessarily best.” As Mundy writes:
As Martha Ertman, a University of Maryland law professor, put it to me, many families just function better when the same person is consistently “in charge of making vaccinations happen, making sure the model of the World War II monument gets done, getting the Christmas tree home or the challah bought by 6 o’clock on Friday.”
In the end, “Rather than setting an example that fathers don’t matter, gay men are setting an example that fathers do matter, and that marriage matters, too.”
Of course, first the struggle to be able to marry must be won. The Washington Post looks at recent, dramatic victories, but also the long road ahead. Under the best of scenarios (assuming, as most do, that the Supreme Court will repeal the most onerous aspects of the Defense of Marriage Act but not impose marriage equality throughout the nation), 40 percent of Americans could live in states that allow gays to marry by the end of 2016. But after that, the road ahead will require overturning anti-gay-marriage constitutional amendments in conservative states.
33 Comments for “The Marriage Evolution”
posted by Lori Heine on
Outright Libertarians is re-forming in Arizona, and will begin working on repealing the anti-gay marriage laws in that state right away.
posted by Houndentenor on
Marriage drastically changed over the last 150 years. Most marriages were arranged well into the 19th century (and in some places they still are). Married couples in the west now set up their own agreements as to how the relationship will work. It is no longer assumed that the man will work while the mother will stay home and raise the children. Perhaps both will work. Or perhaps the father will stay home. There are many ways be married, perhaps as many ways as their are married couples. The change has already happened. Two men or two women are just another way and honestly, not that much different than most of the married couples that I know. It’s not a transformative change. It’s actual what has been the status quo for several decades now.
One quibble. At the risk of picking on Stephen once again (he’s not the only one…I’ve noticed this multiple times this week, mostly on right wing sites), why is the abstract couple referenced in discussions of same sex marriage almost always male? Is it that it’s two dudes that freak people out more than two women? Why is this? I don’t think there’s anything intentional in Stephen’s case. (Maybe he’s imagining himself as half of the couple!) But it just strikes me as odd.
posted by Tom Scharbach on
I’ve noticed this multiple times this week, mostly on right wing sites), why is the abstract couple referenced in discussions of same sex marriage almost always male?
It may be that a patriarchal view of family that dominates right-wing thinking. Just a guess.
posted by Jorge on
I agree.
One of my old social work professors, in talking about groups for male DV batterers that are co-facilitated by two people, made a comment that no matter what the gender split for the group facilitators, it’s models something very beneficial about gender roles and power. I have long believed the same about a good marriage. I believe a same-sex marriage can be better than a straight marriage at modeling for its children that there should be no rigid gender roles, and are probably less likely to fail at modeling gender equality. Straight marriages have the reverse strengths.
posted by Tom Scharbach on
Belgium has had marriage equality for 10 years, Massachusetts for 9 years, Canada for 8 (some of the provinces for 10). The collateral effects of marriage equality on straight marriage are likely to be measurable at this point, and I have seen nothing to suggest that marriage equality has had any significant effect, one way or the other.
posted by Matt on
I agree that the article is refreshingly willing to question politically correct notions about men and women and marriage, but it still wimps out a little. I think this is probably because, by the article’s own admission, it only looked at middle-class and well-off couples and how they fare. And these couples and marriages are the ones in which people have the resources to mitigate the negative consequences of their decisions (the consequences of divorce and of non-monogamy, for example.)
The section that deals with gay male couple’s nonmonogamy is a telling one. We get an expert saying that gay male couples “are in some ways healthier” because they talk about sex more. But come on. In ways that really matter, gay men are not healthier. Having 1 in 5 of your community be infected with HIV is not healthier, especially since the virus still kicks the sh** out of some people, even with antiretrovirals (which can be pretty nasty drugs) and especially since being HIV-positive is still a Very Bad Thing if you are not middle-class (I volunteer with indigent HIV-positive folks, and see day in and day out that for the poor, this is still a disease that dramatically impacts one’s life forever.) Not to mention the higher percentages of alcoholism, drug abuse, and suicide among gay men, which may be in part due to homophobia but which is also related to the poisonous sexual culture that exists in our cities and gay ghettos. In the light of all this, it’s hard to see how the nonmonogamy, and the efforts of powerful gay men like Dan Savage to normalize nonmonogamy, are a good thing or even a mixed bag. If us gay men had the sexual health statistics of lesbians, it might be a different story, but the reality is–and has been for more than 30 years now — that we can see quite clearly what a brutal toll our sexual norms have taken on us.
I realize that Independent Gay Forum, being a libertarian site, doesn’t deal much (or at all) with this stuff, since libertarianism depends on the idea that people make all their decisions rationally, or would do so if governmental pressures were removed. Personally, I think the idea that one could spend any time on this planet at all and believe that people make sexual decisions rationally is itself insane and irrational.
posted by Houndentenor on
Have you read any recent studies concerning extramarital sex? Most couples are not monogamous. The problem isn’t the non-monogamy as much as the fact that they didn’t discuss that they were in an open marriage before one or both partners went out and had sex with someone else. They are in an open marriage with one partner being ignorant of that fact. That to me is the big problem. I think gay couples are more likely to be honest about that with each other. But it’s not as if all same-sex couples are monogamous. In some studies only about 30% are.
That only matters if we assume that all couples will end their marriage when one is caught having an affair. Since that’s not true either (there are far more affairs than divorces), I fail to see how it’s relevant. I am neither for or against people having non-monogamous or monogamish relationships. What I favor is people being honest about what they want and what they are going to be able to do. A lot of people aren’t which is why the divorce rate is so high. Since people have always had extramarital affairs (any who reads literature is aware of this…in fact it must have always happened otherwise there wouldn’t be religious prohibitions on doing so) it’s silly to think that allowing gay couples to marry is a factor or that gay couples will be any better at being monogamous than straight couples have. the difference as far as I can tell is that gay people are on the whole more honest about it both with their partners and most likely with people taking surveys.
posted by Matt on
Houndentenor,
You cite “recent studies,” but I’m using the numbers actually given in the Atlantic piece. If you have better numbers, let me know. The numbers in the Atlantic piece make it clear that gay men are much more likely to *choose* nonmonogamy than other couples. If you have some actual evidence to provide to counter this (including some actual evidence for your claim that “most couples are not monogamous,”) provide it.
But it’s not as if all same-sex couples are monogamous. In some studies only about 30% are.
You are making my point for me. Gay men are much less likely to be monogamous. Gay men are also much more likely — incredibly more likely — to have HIV and to suffer from a large number of other negative health outcomes. You simply don’t deal with this at all in your response.
If you think the Grindr/circuit party/craigslist culture of having anonymous/casual sex with people who do not know about you and do not care about you (and people you do not know and do not care about) for, literally, decades of your life is a culture that leads to human flourishing, go ahead and try to argue that. 1 in 5 gay men are infected with HIV even though contracting HIV is 100% preventable and we have known for more than 20 years how it spreads. And I don’t want to hear that HIV is just a chronic but manageable condition now — because that’s only true for some middle-class and wealthy gay men with the resources that the vast majority of human beings do not have at their disposal.
If you are in a relationship, and you have sex outside of the relationship, you are putting yourself and your partner at risk for HIV and the other STDs that are out there in huge numbers. Why should we pretend that that’s a loving or even neutral way to live one’s life? You are putting your own momentary sexual whims ahead of the person who ought to be incredibly important to you. We all feel these temptations sometimes, but the fact that we feel them does not mean we should indulge them, or normalize acting on them, any more than the feelings of rage or anger or meanness we feel periodically, as imperfect humans, ought to be indulged in or normalized.
What I favor is people being honest about what they want and what they are going to be able to do.
Why is “honesty” being placed ahead of faithfulness, and ahead of protecting your partner’s health? Plenty of people want to be able to have as much sex as they can find. Why are we pretending that that is a noble goal so long as the person is “honest” about it? You would deem noble and good Dan Savage telling his husband that he wanted an “open” relationship in order to save their marriage, *after* they had a kid together and after Savage’s husband had quit his job to take care of the kid. That’s noble and good? Really? That sounds instead like a wealthy and powerful gay man, who wants to be able to bang other people, giving his younger, totally financially dependent husband an ultimatum out of selfishness. (All this is documented in Mark Oppenheimer’s NYT Magazine piece on Dan Savage as a nonmonogamy normalizer.) Savage gets to have sex with other people, gets to pretend that acting in such a selfish manner is actually enlightened and forward-thinking, gets to treat his husband like a doormat, and we’re all supposed to applaud the honesty! Brilliant!
You sound like you’ve swallowed whole the queer-theory/radical-gay-lib notions of sexuality promoted by Foucault, Butler, etc. Pleasure is good and more pleasure is better, and all that matters is consent. Well, the 1970s communal-sewer sex culture that existed in urban gay male America was consensual. It led to the deaths of massive numbers of gay men. They were by and large “honest” about the fact that they didn’t practice monogamy, about the fact that they believed that having sex with anybody you wanted to have sex with and who wanted to have sex with you was fine. And they killed themselves and their own partners in massive numbers.
The idea that *what you do* doesn’t matter, just so long as you’re “honest” about it, is a special kind of insanity that the AIDS epidemic ought to have completely blown up, but that still persists among us, and goes a long way towards explaining why we are still infecting each other with HIV in such hugely disproportionate numbers.
Since people have always had extramarital affairs (any who reads literature is aware of this…in fact it must have always happened otherwise there wouldn’t be religious prohibitions on doing so)
The fact that people have a hard time living up to an ideal is not a good reason for abandoning the ideal or pretending that alternatives to the ideal are just as good as the ideal was. Even if an ideal is hard to live up to, and lots of people fail, they may get closer to it by *trying* for it than they would if they are encouraged to pretend that they need not even try, that indulging whenever they feel like it is just as good.
For instance, yeah, straight people have been having affairs since time immemorial, but there is a difference between a man who has an affair with another woman once during a marriage, and tries his hardest not to do it again, and a normalized nonmonogamous arrangement between two gay men where they both troll for anonymous/casual partners every weekend on the internet. Just in terms of sheer numbers, and in terms of epidemiology statistics, there is a tremendous difference.
How about this. We get the STD numbers, the drug abuse and addition numbers, the suicide numbers down among gay men to something approximating where they are in the heterosexual population, and then we can talk about whether nonmonogamy ought to considered an equally valid option. You are so committed to your smelly little orthodoxy about “honesty” that you cannot see that the actual existing world being created by our poisonous sexual culture is literally making us sick.
But we won’t talk about it, we won’t look it square in the face, and will instead only dwell on gay marriage, because winning gay marriage means doing battle with conservative straight people, and that’s not scary. What’s really scary is dealing with the problems that we can’t blame on other people, that we have to acknowledge is due to our own imperfections. What’s really scary is the idea that we might have to make choices that affect *us*, ourselves, might have to give up or change things about us that we want very much, that the real way forward might lie with us. God forbid.
posted by Houndentenor on
You have completely misrepresented what I wrote.
Yes, more gay men will opt for a non-monogamous relationship. That much is true. What is also true is that the vast majority of heterosexual couples aren’t any more monogamous than the gay male couples. They just lie about it. I find the lying more destructive than the sex. Personally I don’t want a nonmonogamous relationship but based on personal experience I have to admit that it works for some people. And not for others. One size fits all doesn’t work. it never has and it isn’t going to. If you want a monogamous relationship then live that. But don’t make a promise that you know you aren’t going to keep.
Yes, I guess I could go around telling everyone not to have sex except with their committed partner. Churches have been doing that for ages. Did that stop anyone? No. Have the drug laws, even mandatory sentencing, stopped anyone from doing drugs? No, they have not. We need to be honest about what we do and the consequences rather than just preaching a “just say no” message. it’s not working.
About HIV, I’m as concerned as you about the continued spread of this virus. it really should not still be spreading at the rate that it is. We know what to do to greatly reduce the risk of transmission and for some reason too many gay men can’t be bothered to put on a condom. I can’t explain that, but I’m certainly not glib about it.
posted by Matt on
Everything in this is an unsupported assertion that you have adopted in order to make your argument work.
What is also true is that the vast majority of heterosexual couples aren’t any more monogamous than the gay male couples. They just lie about it.
False. You don’t have a shred of proof of this, you just keep asserting it. The Atlantic article quotes numbers that are very different from this lie of yours.
Churches have been doing that for ages. Did that stop anyone?
“Anyone”? Really? So you think that strong cultural norms against nonmonogamy have *zero* effect? If culture norms have *zer0* effect on the people who live in those cultures have no effect on people, then why fight homophobia? It must not be having any effect on us!
We need to be honest about what we do and the consequences rather than just preaching a “just say no” message. it’s not working.
Yes, let’s be honest about what we do and the consequences. *On average*, we have way more casual and anonymous sex with more partners than other groups, and the consequences are high rates of infection. We also have an ethos that says “pleasure is good, and more pleasure is better,” and that normalizes a lifetime of having sex with different people, rather than sticking with just one, as hard as that is. What’s “not working,” as you put it, is our own collective choices to keep up this sexual dead-end of constantly changing partners. Monogamy hasn’t been tried and found wanting; it’s been found difficult and left untried. And you would throw your hands up say “it can’t be done,” just like the others. My point is this: the fact that something is really hard does not mean it is not worth trying. An ideal does not cease to be an ideal just because it’s basically impossible for flawed human beings to achieve it. But your wishy-washy “different things work for different people, there’s no one size fits all, whatever people want to do is fine as long as they’re “honest” ” really is a kind of giving up. It really does reflect an attempt to trash the ideal, to stop trying for it, to deny that it’s any better than anything else. I think that’s a disaster.
posted by Throbert McGee on
Matt, you rock!
posted by Throbert McGee on
Following up on my previous response to Matt —
In my experience, lots of gay men take the following two claims as dogmatic articles of faith:
(1) If Hollywood were to make a movie in which the straight hero beats a gay man to death with a hammer just for laffs, it might inspire copycat behavior among viewers, leading to real-life homophobic assaults.
(2) However, if a gay-owned prOn studio makes a movie in which two men appear to be having a REALLY FUN TIME engaging in bareback anal sex, it couldn’t possibly inspire viewers to imitate the barebacking, and to suggest that it might encourage copycat behavior is superstitious, prudish, and reactionary.
posted by Matt on
What I favor is people being honest about what they want and what they are going to be able to do.
This sentence of yours just perfectly encapsulates the moral bankruptcy of our sexual culture. You favor people being “honest” about what they want, without regard to *what it is* they want. So a superficial kind of “tolerance” allows for the moral equivalence of a wide range of destructive and hurtful actions. There was a piece published Buzzfeed (a site popular with 18-29 year olds) a few months ago that glamorized having unprotected gay sex with a drug-using stranger — the author wrote about doing it and how great it was and how he’ll probably do it again, and how he doesn’t think that means he’s being risky. So, at a time when HIV rates are rising among gay and bi men younger than 29, an extremely popular website was doing its best to normalize incredibly unsafe behavior. And the writer was, of course, being “honest.” He must be a hero in your eyes! According to your noble and advanced form of moral calculus, this guy was a great man! What an accomplishment! What a triumph for gay people that we can be honest as we assert what we want — unprotected sex with strangers on drugs.
You must be so proud!
posted by Houndentenor on
Don’t strawman me. I am not in favor of drug use nor am I in favor of barebacking and other unsafe activities. never have been. That wasn’t what I meant and I think if you had actually read what I wrote you’d know that.
What I favor is couples in a relationship creating a relationship that works for both of them. That, in my opinion, is respectful of the relationship and allows for honesty and trust. If you know you are going to have sex with someone else occasionally and lie about it, that is harmful to the relationship. If you have a partner who isn’t going to be okay with that, then you shouldn’t have made this commitment in the first place. You should have told them up front what you want and let them opt in or out based on that information. That’s my point. that is not me advocating for open relationships. It’s just an acknowledgement that some people are not going to be faithful and that they should find a partner who is okay with that or otherwise not be in a committed relationship in which monogamy is assumed. That’s my point. The rest of what you wrote doesn’t represent anything I’ve ever said or even thought. how dare you lay all that on me. If I could stop people from barebacking or using meth I’d do it right now. I can’t. It’s not that I don’t want to. Those activities are destructive. But making drugs illegal has done almost nothing to curb their abuse. I had plenty of sex with other men while Texas’ sodomy law was in effect. I never once thought, “oh, this is illegal so maybe we shouldn’t do it.” I did wear a condoms, though, because I respect myself and the people I am intimate with enough to do that. I can’t make other people behave the way I want and in fact my belief that people should talk with their partners about what they want and need from the relationship hasn’t changed anyone’s relationship so far as I know. I just don’t have the powers you ascribe to me. Or the beliefs or attitudes.
posted by Matt on
Houndentenor–
Don’t strawman me.
Do you know what “straw man” means? Having sex while on meth with strangers and choosing to have unprotected sex with strangers is a very real problem that flows *directly* from your mistaken belief that all that matters is being “honest.” Plenty of the people who are engaging in those behaviors ARE being “honest”, as you define it, incredibly lamely, to mean only that they’re not cheating on partners who think they’re being monogamous. Those behaviors flow *directly* from the impoverished sexual ethics you yourself promote. The fact that you don’t directly engage in them is incidental. If you wanted to, and if you were “honest” about wanting to, what, in your sexual ethics, would stop you?
What I favor is people being honest about what they want and what they are going to be able to do.
You said it, not me. Now you claim that you’re actually not in favor of people doing just whatever they want, if what they want is unprotected sex or sex on meth. So which is it? Are you in favor of people being “honest about what they want what they are going to be able to do,” or not?
it’s just an acknowledgement that some people are not going to be faithful and that they should find a partner who is okay with that or otherwise not be in a committed relationship in which monogamy is assumed.
Well, you could say that some people are just going to use drugs. So I guess we should just write them off and say that all that matters is that they be “honest” about their drug use, right? Of course, you say you’re not in favor of drug use. You were willing to say you’re not in favor of that, so why aren’t you willing to say that you’re not in favor of nonmonogamy? Why is it that we can recognize that one is a negative, but that the other one we have to pretend is just a part of life and is equally as valid as any other choice and all that matters is being “honest” about it?
If we can, in fact, say, No, you *shouldn’t* do certain things, whether you want to do them or not, then your whole ethos falls apart.
I am not in favor of drug use nor am I in favor of barebacking and other unsafe activities… What I favor is couples in a relationship creating a relationship that works for both of them.
Don’t you see the contradiction? Plenty of couples “agree” on a relationship that involves nonmonogamy and drug use. Do you doubt this? So are you in favor of that, or not?
You first pretend that all that matters is honesty, and when I point out that plenty of people are “honest” about their desires to do very destructive things, you take a step back and try to dissociate yourself from the worst of those things, while still trying to pretend that you haven’t contradicted yourself. But if we can say that people should not use meth, we can also say that people should not have nonmonogamous relationships.
posted by Houndentenor on
If my disapproval changed other people’s behavior, this world would be a far different place. But it doesn’t.
But no, I’m not going to say that everyone has to be in a monogamous relationship. I know people who are in open relationships and are quite happy that way. I am also aware that their relationship would be the same whether I approved or not. I don’t approve or not approve. It’s actually none of my business. In their honesty they are not hurting anyone. They also use condoms, which is the only lecture I would give them (if I were going to do that).
I was just accused of being judgmental on this very site in the last month. Now I’m not judgmental enough? What I have learned in the last few decades is that it’s not about whether or not I approve of what others are doing. it’s that other people don’t care what I think, nor should they. You seem to think that disapproval will shame people into changing their behavior. I’d like to throw out an alternate hypothesis…I think many people act in self destructive ways (drug use, risky sexual practices) as a result of guilt and shame throw on them over their sexuality. Adding more shame only increases those activities. What you propose, in my opinion, is just pouring fuel on the fire. it’s just a hypothesis, but I’ve been noticing certain patterns for years and while it’s probably too simplistic an explanation and probably doesn’t apply in all cases, I am convinced that it’s often very much the case.
posted by Matt on
Houndentenor,
Your comments about drug use and condoms make clear that you are willing to say that some things should be off limits. But you won’t say that nonmonogamous relationships should be.
I think you represent a big swath of gay men, and of gay male culture generally. We are a tiny minority that has endured massive amounts of disease and suffering, and that to this day suffers ill health far out of proportion relative to the general population (again, check out the HIV statistics) . Yet the one thing we will not do, the one thing we balk at doing, even after surviving the mass deaths of AIDS, for goodness’ sake, is commit to monogamy as an ideal. We won’t do it. Holding up nonmonogamy and casual and anonymous sex is sacred, and we will claim laughably empty and meaningless standards, like “What matters is just being honest about what you want” rather than give up that thing which is sacred to us.
The study of anthropology is largely based on the idea that you learn about a culture by learning about what it holds sacred. We hold not just sex, but specifically sex *outside* of a meaningful and committed relationship, as sacred. Until we start facing and dealing with the consequences of *that*, until we start questioning the queer-theory/French-radical-gay-sex-liberation theology that continues to hold sway over us so thoroughly that we quite literally make ourselves sick–until we start doing something about that, we will continue to make not just our own lives, but the lives of all the gay men not yet out, or even born, harder, harsher, crueler, and more full of unpleasant statistics than they might otherwise be.
posted by Matt on
It’s just an acknowledgement that some people are not going to be faithful and that they should find a partner who is okay with that or otherwise not be in a committed relationship in which monogamy is assumed.
“Some people” are going to do all kinds of negative things. Some people are going to speed. Some are going to litter. Some are going to molest children. Some are going to lie, some are going to insider trade, some are going to nag their partners every day for years. Some are going to murder. Your “enlightened” worldview involves recognizing that fact — that people are going to do things they shouldn’t — but then goes further to normalize the selfish or destructive behavior as “just another choice.” And asserts that all that matters is that people be “honest” about it. How about we *ask* people *not to do it?* Yeah, keeping yourself from having sex with hot and willing guys is hard. That’s not an argument for giving up at trying to be monogamous! Lots of people are hard-wired, in their brains, to be alcoholics or drug addicts. But you were willing to write that you don’t condone drug use.
If you really do care about the HIV statistics, and I hope you sincerely do, then part of addressing those statistics means trying to change the culture that we swim in every day as gay men, a culture that encourages us to see ourselves as incapable of doing anything other than have lots of casual sex when we want to have it and can find willing partners, with just the hope that the other guy ( who is, by definition, someone we don’t know well) uses protection correctly and thoroughly, even though we *know* that 1 in 5 gay men are managing to get themselves infected! And changing the culture means changing the very things that we currently see as so sacred that we are willing, lots of us, to play these losing odds just about every weekend in our gay ghettos and major cities.
posted by Houndentenor on
Nice rant. So tell me what exactly you want me to do to get other people to stop barebacking?
posted by Tom Scharbach on
Matt, I have several thoughts:
(1) The issues of marriage/monogamy and STD prevention are related, but distinct. STD prevention is not dependent upon universal adoption of marriage/monogamy as the gay cultural norm or upon the reduction of the number of sex partners a gay man has over his lifetime, but instead depends upon universal adoption of safer sex practices.
(2) Your comments largely ignore the critical importance of safer sex. Although it is obvious that reducing the number of sexual partners and marriage/monogamy both reduce the risk of STD infection, neither are a substitute for safer sex. In fact, it doesn’t matter much how many sexual partners a person has if a person is invariably practices safer sex (a person who invariably practices safer sex is at relative low risk, regardless), but unless a person practices safer sex, reducing the number of sexual partners and/or marriage/monogamy won’t do much to reduce the rates of STD infection (a person who does not practice safer sex is at high risk, regardless).
(3) STD/HIV rates remain high among gay men, despite the experience of men of my generation, a generation that lost a lot of good men to HIV. I think that can be attributed primarily to the sharp rise in STD/HIV infections in teens and younger gay men, and to the continued high rates of infections among men of all ages outside the middle class. I don’t think that there is a simple explanation as to why, or a single explanation. I spent my time working with STD/HIV prevention and care, as you are doing, and like you probably are, I’m aware of how complex the issue is, as are all issues involving human behavior, and that different issues present themselves in differing subcultures of gay men. It is going to take a sustained effort to reduce the rates of STD/HIV infection among gay men, and in particular those who are younger and those who are outside the middle class, and I don’t see that effort happening with the intensity that it did during the 1980’s and 1990’s, when men my age all had a dozen friends dead or dying.
(4) I tend to agree that “the poisonous sexual culture that exists in our cities and gay ghettos” contributes to health risks, depression rates, suicide rates and so on, but it is not the sole factor involved, and perhaps is as much a symptom as a disease. The poisonous messaging from conservative Christians, our culture’s expectations concerning the lives and outcomes for gay men, rejection and scorn for gays in general, and many other factors in our culture contribute mightily, and are, perhaps, the reason that the gay ghetto culture developed in the first place and continues to exist.
(5) I don’t think that it is realistic to think that the gay ghetto culture can be dismantled until there is an alternative. What does it mean to talk about monogamy in marriage as a cultural norm when marriage isn’t available as an option? We’ve got to win marriage equality, establish marriage as a way of living within gay culture, and when we have done that, then we can do what straight people now do, which is to encourage marriage/monogamy.
I should probably issue a disclaimer at this point. I am a rube.
I am 65 years old and have never lived within the gay ghetto culture. Ghetto life never appealed to me. Promiscuity has never been part of my life, and it is not something that I wanted. My nature is to live in a relationship, and to be monogamous within that relationship. I’ve had lots of sex in my lifetime, but I can count the number of sexual partners on one hand plus one thumb, literally. I’ve been lucky in life in that respect.
So I’m talking about the gay ghetto culture as an outsider, knowing about it only as a result of my work with HIV counseling, from what I read about it, and from my visits to the gay ghettos, which are not frequent.
The men I know live outside that culture, too. The men I know, even in cities like Chicago and Milwaukee, tend to be sexually responsible rather than not. I know the gay ghetto exists, but I know a lot more about the gay world outside the ghetto.
As a result, I question how ingrained the gay ghetto culture is within larger gay culture. I don’t know, but I am willing to bet that the gay ghettos have a cultural impact far beyond the number of gay men who actually live the ghetto lifestyle, largely because out cultural megaphones are in the cities and the gay ghettos.
posted by Lori Heine on
I’m not sure why some people insist on trying to characterize those in the “gay ghetto” as the mainstream of gay life. I suspect there are far more Toms and Houndentenors than there are people whose life resembles one long Pride festival.
I haven’t been to Pride for years, and neither have most of my friends. Tinkerbell popping out of a cake, or leatherbabes on bikes, simply don’t represent us. And I question the studies pulled out by alarmed guardians of morality to suggest how generally awful we are.
In my experience, we’re pretty much like most straight people. If people are not remaining monogamous, the blame cannot be placed at the doorstep of the five percent of the population who are gay.
posted by Houndentenor on
I guess this is the part where I admit that I moved from Montrose (Houston) to Chelsea (NYC). I had a straight roommate for two years in Houston and he was a way bigger slut than I ever was! I enjoyed living in the gayborhood for awhile (the scenery was fantastic!) but my apartment was too small and too expensive and I left. I hardy ever go to bars any more (I haven’t been to a gay bar since I moved to Dallas last fall) and was never much for hook-ups (although rules are made to be broken!). I also don’t judge people who want to have a bit of reasonably responsible fun. I have also seen the tolls that alcohol, drugs and too much partying can take on someone’s health and career. I’ve always been an advocate of safe sex. But I think what Lori’s point is, and it’s a good one, is that most gay people don’t live in a gay ghetto, and most who do don’t stay there all that long. I only know one person who’s ever been to a circuit party and he only went once. That is a very tiny percentage of gay people. It’s what the religious right loves to show to drum up anti-gay bigotry (mostly at election or fundraising time), but it’s not typical. I remember when I was first out realizing that I knew far more gay men who worked for accounting firms than hair salons. We’re mostly just as boring as everyone else.
posted by Don on
wow. didn’t know gay ghettos were evil.
or that everyone who lived in them was having crystal meth fueled sex until the wee hours every night. Having lived in Atlanta’s midtown during the mid-90s and moved to South Beach (the most evil of them all) after that, I must say I knew people who lived such lives but even they were a small minority within the small minority of the ghettos.
those who live hidden in the hinterlands would do well to be grateful for all those gay ghettos. it was a gay ghetto that launched Harvey Milk’s career. Gay Key West put gay people in a majority there and changed the way people who visited the island thought about gay people.
I don’t live in a ghetto anymore. I liked them for their sense of community and camaraderie. I also liked them for their political force. whereas an openly gay council member in the city of Atlanta was impossible at the time, we had a very vocal ally because we made up more than half her district and had tons of cash.
Having lived there, the general view of the “townies” in their conservative suburbs were “out of the bars and into the streets!” See, the khaki-pants set (men or women) weren’t going to come out. they were afraid of their neighbors, their jobs, and their precious incomes. ghetto folk weren’t afraid.
as for the offensive leather queens in pride parades, my favorite were always the Digging Dykes of Decatur (metro Atlanta). They dressed in housewife gardening clothes, floppy hats and usually drove riding lawnmowers in the parade. Their group’s sole purpose was “to prove that lesbians have a sense of humor.” Or so they claimed. They absolutely did.
Now that I live in Miami (not South Beach) there are many gay couples that are out, live amongst straight people honestly, and serve on community boards and organize with straight people all the time. Such people have always existed. But I think they owe it to the ghettos (at the very least Harvey Milk’s ghetto) for not being too drunk or high to organize and make a difference for those hiding in the burbs.
posted by Houndentenor on
I think some of the gayborhoods are coming to an end. Yes, there will always be clusters of gay-oriented businesses (not just bars) and they will be needed, but in NYC for example, young gay people can’t afford to live in Chelsea or Hell’s Kitchen like I did. (I moved during a brief real estate downturn in the mid-90s.) People are also more likely building networks through social media rather than at bars. That said, people will always want a place to congregate with their friends and even now and even in big cities, I still feel more free to be myself in a predominantly gay area. I hope those safe spaces always exist because even as people become more tolerant (not tolerant enough I see from the news of recent NYC gay-bashings) we are still a minority and will need some spaces where we are with our own kind, even if it’s just a few hours a week. I loved my time in Montrose and Chelsea. It really wasn’t the non-stop party people like to make it out to be. And even by the time I left (2000) the movie stars and trust-funded yuppies were moving in. As they say, there goes the neighborhood.
posted by Doug on
” It’s what the religious right loves to show to drum up anti-gay bigotry. . . “, while conveniently ignoring the fact that there are a significant number of ‘swinger clubs’ across the country, not to mention a thriving straight prostitution business in most cities.
posted by Houndentenor on
They are well aware of those things, because plenty of them partake of those activities like Jeri Ryan’s would be Senator husband (swinger’s clubs) and David Vitter (prostitutes). In fact, it seems that the louder we hear someone rant and rave about “sin” the more likely they are to be committing it. Perhaps someone should look for Matt’s PnP profile on Grindr. (j/k)
posted by Houndentenor on
It seems that my live and let live attitude is causing people to use meth and bareback. If only I’d known I had such powerful psychic abilities I’d have also used them to get people to quit smoking stop polluting. It’s just bizarre to read Matt’s rants. I merely accept that some people are in open relationships and I refuse to sit in judgment of them (as if they care what I think anyway). It’s just bizarre thinking. I think a lot of things and approve and disapprove of a lot of things and so far as I can tell the only person’s behavior I’ve ever been able to change is my own.
posted by Throbert McGee on
Me too!
Although, admittedly, I’d have to resort to chisanbop:
Each finger on the left hand represents “ten”, and the left thumb represents “fifty”. In this way, all values between zero and ninety-nine can be indicated on two hands.
(Although… wait, does a guy you only do mutual masturbation with count as a “sex partner”? I was a regular participant at circle-jerk parties in NYC when I was in my 20s, so that significantly increased my “sex partner” count even though it didn’t increase my risk of catching or vectoring most STDs.)
posted by Throbert McGee on
Okay, so you think that fundamentalist disapproval of any and all homosexual relations has the power to modify the behavior of some homosexuals (i.e., modify it in a more self-destructive direction); but if YOU, as an openly homosexual person, were to vocally disapprove of gay promiscuity while endorsing and applauding gay monogamy, there would be no effect, and no one’s behavior would change, because no one would listen to you.
Is that your working theory?
posted by Houndentenor on
It has been my experience that even in matters in which my opinion ought to have some effect (musical ones) that my disapproval of certain practices carries virtually no weight at all. When people who ask my opinion and acknowledge my expertise ignore my opinions, I have no confidence whatsoever that strangers who didn’t ask me what I think and don’t have any reason to care will alter their behavior based on my disapproval. That is my experience. I do try to make a difference. Not once has anyone asked me what I though before hooking up or starting an affair. Not once. So this idea that what I “endorse” matters to anyone but me, is just absurd.
posted by Throbert McGee on
Incidentally, my general philosophy is that homophobic language — whether it’s “God Hates F@gs” or “homosexuality is intrinsically disordered and objectively evil” — has EXACTLY the same amount of power as a handful of fingernail clippings sprinkled with chicken blood.
Which is to say, no power whatsoever, except over the minds of the very, very credulous.
I do have total sympathy for people who grew up being exposed to regular doses of anti-gay voodoo. But promulgating the notion that they shouldn’t be blamed for their willfully self-destructive behaviors — they can’t help it, because some witch doctor in a Roman collar once uttered a hex at them — merely encourages them to persist in the superstitious belief that voodoo actually works.
And from there, it’s a slippery slope to believing in the Gambler’s Fallacy, homeopathic medicine, and Young Earth Creationism…
posted by Houndentenor on
I’m as disgusted by Fred Phelps and his family posing as a church as anyone else and have been since well before he was showing up at the funerals of soldiers. They used to picket the funerals of people of people who died of AIDS but they couldn’t get any media coverage for that because not enough people cared. The Phelpses say horrible things to get free publicity. We give it to them. Then they do some more disgusting things. Occasionally someone oversteps (understandably so) and hits one of them or bans them from where they technically have a right to be and they sue (the daughter went to law school…they know exactly where the legal lines are) and they use the money from those lawsuits to fund their little operation. it’s quite the scam and it will continue so long as we keep giving them the attention they crave. And here I am being a hypocrite by talking about them. it’s hard not to, but the only way to make them go away is to stop giving them the publicity they crave. There are plenty of people saying horrible things all over the country. We don’t hand them a microphone and put them on the evening news and we shouldn’t do the same with Shirley Phelps her brats either. I know that’s hard but it’s the only way.
posted by Stephen on
Mr McGee, I find that an astonishing denigration of the lives of gay men and women in the US since WWII. Shame has been our burden, the millstone we try to pull from off our necks. It seems that you entirely escaped it. My congratulations.