All right, no one’s going to get a million dollars off this, but considering where our comment count is, someone could get that copy of Velvet Goldmine that’s going for the 3,000th comment. The question:
Why are lesbian and bisexual women so into gay porn? Granted, generally not the hardcore stuff; it’s more written, or artwork, or even artistic photographs. (I’m not even into the hardcore stuff; porn just makes me giggle. Those faces they make…gods, I hope I don’t look that stupid during sex.) I kind of get it when it’s straight women; it’s the (more tasteful) equivalent of straight men getting their rocks off on lesbian porn, without the drool, grunting, and inevitable need for a wet wipe.
I’m not censuring; I’m just curious, and I’m interested in hearing you talk about your interests, why, what appeals to you, without feeling the need to defend yourself. It’s just something outside the realm of my experience; as a gay man I’m not so into lesbians or yuri fic/art/etc., so the rather large population of lesbians and bisexual women in the yaoi/shounen ai/slash community just baffles me. Since this is something I have no clue about, educate me. Be as honest and detailed as you want. If you’re not particularly interested in the attachments (or at least not interested in letting them anywhere near you, and you know, some days and with some guys I really can’t blame you), why is the erotic aspect of two men together so fascinating? Hell, if you straight or asexual girls want to throw in your perspective, too, knock yourselves out. Any story that’s worth telling is worth hearing.
Thomas Beatie has been on my mind a lot lately, mainly because I’ve been wondering what I would do in his situation, and if I could even go through with what he’s doing. One question led to another, and suddenly a million chaotic theories and thoughts were chasing each other around my mind, issues related to reproductive rights, societal behavior… everything. And out of that came more questions still - well, you see where this is going. Although these are questions that I asked myself (or more like rationalized out along a train of thought), I’d like to ask you as well. I’ll provide my own answers below each question; I’d like to hear your answers in the comments.
1. If you’re male or FtM, imagine that you’re capable of conceiving and carrying a child to term. If you’re female or MtF, imagine that you’re capable of impregnating a partner. If you could and your partner wanted it (whether it’s the only option for childbirth or one of many), would you?
Not just no, hell no - mainly because children give me the creepy-crawlies and I’m about as child-friendly as ball pool filled with rusty razor blades. I think people should have the right to pursue such avenues (such as a transwoman impregnating a biological female, or a transmale being impregnated by a biological male/artificial insemination) if that’s what makes them happiest, as it shouldn’t matter how the child was brought into the world or which parent was involved in what part of conception as long as neither parent was harmed and the child is wanted and happy. I just couldn’t do it myself, and any partner who asked me to wouldn’t be someone I’d end up with long-term, because it tends to ruin relationships if your partner doesn’t respect your decisions about children - whether you want them or not. Besides, I may have an extremely high pain threshold, but not high enough to squeeze something the size of a basketball out of any orifice of my body. No thank you, though I admire those who can.
2. Do you believe that doctors have the right to refuse treatment to patients based on their personal beliefs?
Again, hell no. I think doctors have a moral obligation above their personal beliefs, and that moral obligation is to see to the health and well-being of all their patients - which means performing procedures that they might not morally agree with. Can you imagine what would have happened to Thomas Beatie if every available doctor refused to treat his ectopic pregnancy because of personal beliefs? He could have died. The obligation to a patient’s life and its preservation stands far above any personal or religious beliefs. As long as the procedure is not damaging to the patient’s or anyone else’s mental or physical well-being, then yes, the doctor is obligated to perform it, and perform it to the best of their abilities. I can’t refuse to do one of my writing projects just because I object to my client’s obnoxiously masturbatory self-image based on my personal beliefs, and my work doesn’t even affect one’s health.
This can get into shady grey areas when it comes to optional procedures such as cosmetic surgeries or gender reassignment surgeries, but I’ll cover that in my answer to the next question, as I think that relates to safeguarding the patient’s mental well-being as well when it comes to allowing them to live happily as their chosen self without the struggles (depression, stress, etc.) that can come from being denied what they need.
3. Specifically in relation to reproductive rights: Do you think that doctors have the right to refuse to perform vasectomies on men or hysterectomies, tubal ligations, or implantation of contraceptive devices in women and FtMs based on their eligibility to breed?
…only in very specific situations, and only with consultation from an unbiased outside party.
Before you crucify me: I think that anyone, male or female, should have full control of their bodies and definitely of their reproductive systems - but I do understand somewhat why some doctors deny patients. Many doctors have been victims of malpractice suits by patients who said they wanted a certain surgery, then years later changed their minds, couldn’t have it reversed, and sued their doctor for allowing them to go through with the decision and rendering them unable to conceive. That’s one reason that doctors often deny people who are still of safe childbearing age.
But there are other reasons that I really can’t agree with - mainly patriarchal and religious stances that value a person’s ability to breed above the person themselves, their desires, and their health. Even if it would make them miserable, even if they’re staunchly against ever having children and are quite certain of their own minds, they’re told placidly that they’ll change their minds (because of course everyone wants children, it’s inconceivable that someone wouldn’t) and denied contraceptive surgeries…even if they’re getting them not to avoid children, but to transition from one gender to the other. Some people even view people who have such surgeries as sluts, who just want those surgeries so they can have indiscriminate sex with anyone and anything moving.
Those views, restrictive and condescending and dehumanizing, I cannot abide. Yes, some people do change their minds and regret it later, because they made hasty, impulsive decisions - but there are people capable of making up their minds after lengthy self-analysis, and there are perfectly normal, respectable people who just don’t want children. Ever.
The problem arises when asking a doctor to determine which is which. While a physician or surgeon is a licensed health professional, not so many serve double duty as a licensed mental health professional, capable of determining if a person is capable of making this decision in an educated adult fashion. The easiest way is just to say no, period, unless they can determine that the person is in actual physical danger and requires the procedure.
Or you could just bring in a licensed therapist.
Seriously; that would keep everyone’s balls out of the grinder. Why not make 6 months of professional therapy a pre-surgical requirement? The therapist would counsel the person on their reasons for wanting surgery to remove or limit their reproductive organs, whether it’s gender reassignment or just a serious desire not to have children, make them aware of the eventualities and pitfalls, ask all the right questions so that they analyze their motivations and don’t make the wrong decision…and at the end of the six months, determine if they’re in sound enough mind to be certain of the decision. At the end of the 6 months, both the therapist and the patient sign off on the counseling, with the patient also agreeing that they still stand by their decision and thus can’t sue the therapist or surgeon for malpractice. With that signature from the therapist, the doctor should then be bound by law to perform the procedure.
Wishful thinking, eh? Then again, there’s also the problem that the burden of personal beliefs then shifts to the therapist, who could still make judgments based on personal beliefs whether they’re supposed to or not and even though they’re trained to offer counsel without personal influence.
Then again, it’s my experience that mental health professionals are better equipped to handle these things than doctors, and can be a bit less biased…or at least put aside their bias more easily.
…now stop looking at me like that. I went to therapy voluntarily for a few months so I could kick my familial issues to the curb and get on with my life. I’m crazy, but I’m not that crazy.
So what are your answers? Would you, could you, should you?
It’s 11:34a, and I’m sitting in the food court of the Sharpstown Center a few blocks from the library. Today was my first day walking the nearly three miles from my apartment to the library; I thought, carrying the laptop bag, that it would take me about an hour and a half. It took me fifty minutes, and here I am killing time until the library opens at noon. My shoulders ache a little; the laptop’s heavy. My eyes sting from walking on a major street for almost an hour with dirty air blowing into my eyes and irritating my contact lenses. My hair is a mess, but this time I had the sense to use better gel. My nostrils are full of the scent of wild onion flowers, more potent than I’ve smelled since childhood summers playing in my grandmother’s backyard in Ponchatoula, Louisiana.
For some reason those years and that place were on my mind today - likely because as I walked, I passed dozens of children and teenagers. Everyone’s out on break and enjoying the sun paired with the cool spring wind; it’s a lovely day. Arrogant boys with that swagger that owns the world jerked their chins at me in passing on the sidewalk; harried mothers shepherded their children along and smiled in acknowledgment when I stepped onto the grass so they could pass without hindrance. Most of the children looked happy, chattering gaily with their friends. A few isolated themselves, held back from the others and keeping, for the most part, quiet. They didn’t seem miserable; just…separate, as if there was something that set them apart from their friends.
I want to say that I remember that feeling, but in truth, it’s barely a shadow of recollection, faded by time. I’ve said before that I didn’t even know what homosexuality was until my early teens; I had no idea what the word was for why I felt just a little different from my peers - why when one of my closest neighborhood friends started noticing girls, I subtly started noticing him. The thing was, I didn’t care. Although I have a bad history with my family, I didn’t have an unhappy childhood despite being poor. I wasn’t a miserable outcast, isolated at an early age by my sexuality; that didn’t come until my preteen years, and that was more caused by my surly attitude, smart mouth, and budding misanthropy. It wasn’t because of any inner knowledge of difference, isolation. Many people say they knew, from the moment they became self-aware. I didn’t. And I didn’t need to.
What I knew, as a child, was that I could catch dragonflies by the wings, holding them carefully until they got used to my touch and would settle on my finger without coercion, only to start and fly away if I moved too fast. I knew that pine trees were all wrong for tree houses, but for ground-level clubhouses it was always best to layer a thick sheaf of fresh green needles over the outside of the structure and stick it in place with the thick, resinous sap, so that water would sheet off and it would be safe to take shelter from the rain. I knew that if you plucked the stems of wild clover flowers and tied them around each other, you could make a necklace that would leave pollen all over your shirt and fill your nose with its sweet, musty scent all day. I knew the smell of thick swamp mud, the faint bubble that pops to the surface right before a mud turtle comes floating up to stumble into my grip, the wet squish of a crawfish’s mud cone as I kicked it over with my sneakers. I knew skinned knees and Sega on a rainy day at O’Neil’s house, and going home to the soft, homemade sugar cookies that my mother always baked no matter how tired or angry she was.
I knew all I needed to know, as a child. I didn’t know that I was gay, and I wouldn’t have wanted to - not in this world, in this time. I was a child for as long as I could be, blissfully unaware and wearing my heart on my sleeve, unaware of the hurt and the wonder, the struggle and the beauty, that could come from one single word that has, in many ways, shaped my life since then.
And no matter how many people proudly proclaim that they’ve known since they were toddlers…
Yesterday, April Gilford at Life as a Christian Woman sent me a link to an article on Christian Newswire, by a member of Concerned Women for America. The article discusses fears of a bacterial epidemic as cases of deadly MRSA, more commonly known as Staph, begin to rise. Staph infections are rising everywhere, but the article highlights the growing percentage among gay men. At first I saw a cause for concern, but didn’t quite see the cause for anger…until I read further.
I don’t normally copy the full text of articles; just the relevant points. But this…this must be seen.
WASHINGTON, Jan. 15 /Christian Newswire/ — Reuters has reported that, “A drug-resistant strain of potentially deadly bacteria has moved beyond the borders of U.S. hospitals and is being transmitted among gay men during sex, researchers said on Monday.
“They said methicillin-resistant Staphylococcus aureus, or MRSA, is beginning to appear outside hospitals in San Francisco, Boston, New York and Los Angeles.”
“‘Once this reaches the general population, it will be truly unstoppable,’ said Binh Diep, a researcher at the University of California, San Francisco who led the study.”
According to the study, at this point, homosexual men are 13 times more likely to contract the potentially deadly, drug-resistant strain of staph infection, but the fear is that, because the infection is spread via skin-to-skin contact, homosexual men may soon spread it to the general population.
Matt Barber, Policy Director for Cultural issues with Concerned Women for America (CWA), said, “The medical community has known for years that homosexual conduct, especially among males, creates a breeding ground for often deadly disease. In recent years we have seen a profound resurgence in cases of HIV/AIDS, syphilis, rectal gonorrhea and many other STDs among those who call themselves ‘gay.’
“The human body is quite callous in how it handles mistreatment and the perversion of its natural functions. When two men mimic the act of heterosexual intercourse with one another, they create an environment, a biological counterfeit, wherein disease can thrive. Unnatural behaviors beget natural consequences.
“In recent years our culture has adopted a laissez faire attitude toward sexual deviancy. Television shows like Will and Grace glorify the homosexual lifestyle while our children are taught in schools that homosexuality is a perfectly healthy, alternative sexual ‘orientation.’ ‘Stay out of our bedrooms!’ we’re often commanded by militant ‘gay’ activists.
“Well, now the dangerous and possibly deadly consequence of what occurs in those bedrooms is spilling over into the general population. It’s not only frightening, it’s infuriating.
“Citizens, especially parents, need to stand up and say, ‘No More! We will no longer sit idly by while politically correct cultural elites endanger our children and larger communities through propagandist promotion of this demonstrably deadly lifestyle.’
“Why does it take a potentially deadly staph epidemic for people to acknowledge reality? Will that even do it? Enough is enough!” concluded Barber.
Is that what we are, then? Plague rats to be exterminated? Typhoid Mary crossbred with Venus as a Boy, black plague in the flesh, just another reason to hate us, brand us, lay the troubles of the world at our feet. Counterfeit they call our love. Unnatural they call our lives. Deviant they call our flesh, and perverse they call us for pleading to be seen and heard, asking for nothing more than acceptance and understanding. They seek any cause they can to vilify us, twist the truth until we are naught but devils in the eyes of a world forced to “acknowledge reality”: a false reality in which zealots will do anything to eliminate those who don’t follow their ways, more militant than those they seek to condemn.
Perhaps we should do no more than give that which we receive.
The article is right. Enough is enough. You want citizens to stand up and say “no more”? Then I will stand. I, a red-blooded American citizen, will stand and say “No more.” No more of your blame; no more of your bigotry, no more of your finger-pointing, no more of your hatred. No more of your lies, no more of your propaganda, and no more will I let you try to dictate how I live my life and who I dare to love.
I speak now to you, and you, and every living thing who would stand before us and refuse to acknowledge our worth, our equality, our validity, and the very core of our human nature. I stand before you, and I say no more will we be your scapegoats; no more will we be your demons, no more will we carry your martyrdom upon our bowed and straining shoulders.
No more will we lie down and let you trod your rough and filthy feet upon the very idea of our existence. No more will we fear your retribution, fear your violence and rejection, all while you cry that we are the ones endangering you. We have offered the olive branch, we have offered compromise, we have offered understanding and education - only to have them thrown back in our faces like so much offal. Are we so unclean? Are we so reviled? Are we, in our desire to love, so much more besmirched than those who would smear themselves with the war paint of hatred and shout from the mountaintops for the blood of our demise?
No. No, we are not. And so I say no more will I sit quietly, no more will I bite my tongue politely, no more will I leash the weapons of my words and thoughts in the hopes that some day, some how, diplomacy will gain some higher ground.
No more will I let you make me feel regret for what I am.
I will stand. I will stand, until the strength bleeds from the very limbs of those who would hurl their slurs and stones to cripple me. I will stand until the blood runs from my veins and the last breath leaves my lips, until my flesh falters and fails and yet still the fire prevails. I will stand until you cannot help but see me - me and not your dogma, see a human, a man no more or less vile than your father, brother, lover, son. I will stand until you can no longer look me in the eye and my pride becomes your shame.
No matter what you say, no matter what you do, I will stand - and dare you to knock me down.
One of the things that piques me most strongly about the disparity in perceptions between the heterosexual and homosexual communities is the assumption that heterosexuals are clean, wholesome people who never sleep around, never do drugs, always practice safe sex, and would never engage in intercourse with someone they weren’t wholly committed to - while homosexuals are considered promiscuous, reckless, and profligate, ridden with disease and addled by drug habits marked upon the community as clearly as heroin tracks down a junkie’s arms.
Stereotypes ignore the high rates of teenage birth among the heterosexual population, the divorce rates (often due to infidelity), the unemployment rates, the education statistics, the drug use statistics…while at the same time ignoring the high percentage of the homosexual population who believe in commitment, who practice safe sex, who are self-sufficient, drug free and responsible citizens who seek to educate themselves and contribute to society.
Neither stereotype is correct; neither positive or negative view can wholly represent either demographic, but instead only highlight extremes used as ammunition against the opposition when attempting to claim equality or even superiority. We are all greater than the sum of our parts; so, too, are the many demographics that we all represent greater than the sum of their parts. The creature that we create known as the “community” is larger than we, a giant and representative beast, faceless and almost autonomous from its many minuscule and independent cells - and like healthy skin stretched smooth over cancer cells, like tarnished scars over a strong and beating heart, that monolith of the community often lies about the very parts that comprise it.
Is the face of your community lie, or truth? Do you exemplify it or defy it? Among your demographic, where do you fit?
2.) What is your sexuality? (If you’re transgender, choose the sexuality you define yourself as with your chosen gender.)
(a) Heterosexual.
(b) Homosexual.
(c) Bisexual.
(d) Asexual.
(e) Confused as hell.
(f) Cannot define because genderqueer/intersexed.
3.) Are you currently in a relationship?
(a) Yes, and I’m happy with it.
(b) Yes, but I’m looking to end it.
(c) No, and I’m not looking for one.
(d) No, but I’d like to be in one.
(e) I’m dating, but not really committed.
(f) I’m in multiple relationships/open relationships.
(g) I’m not sure.
4.) Are you now or have you ever been sexually active?
(a) I have been in the past and I am now.
(b) I have been in the past, but I’m not right now.
(c) I’ve never been sexually active/I’m a virgin.
5.) How many sexual partners have you had in the past?
(a) None.
(b) None, but I have fooled around a lot beyond first base.
(c) One to five.
(d) Six to ten.
(e) Eleven to twenty-five.
(f) Twenty-six or more.
(g) So many that I’ve lost count.
(h) I’m not sure/I’ve never counted.
(i) That’s private/I don’t want to discuss it publicly.
6.) Do you practice safe sex/exchange of bodily fluids?
(a) Yes; always.
(b) Some of the time, when I remember to.
(c) I mean to, but I rarely remember.
(d) It depends on my partner and if I trust them or know they’ve
been tested.
(e) No; never. I don’t even think about it.
(f) I’m a virgin/I don’t fool around.
7.) Were you ever educated about the dangers of unprotected sex?
(a) No. I’m not sure what you’re talking about.
(b) I was never educated, but I learned on my own.
(c) Yes; I was given educational material/instruction about
unprotected sex.
8.) Do you or have you ever used drugs?
(a) Yes, and I still do.
(b) Yes, but I don’t anymore.
(c) Yes, but I’m trying to quit.
(d) Yes, but only lighter things; nothing hard/heavy.
(e) No, and I never have.
(f) No, but I would be open to trying it.
9.) How do you feel about drug use in others?
(a) It’s their life; I don’t care.
(b) I’m strictly against it; no one should do drugs.
(c) I’m strictly against it, but won’t stop them as long as they don’t
associate with me.
(d) I’m all for it.
(e) I’m all right with it as long as it’s regulated and done in
moderation.
10.) Are you currently employed?
(a) Yes, but I’m looking for other work.
(b) Yes, but I’m not looking for other work.
(c) No, but I’m looking for work.
(d) No, but I’m not looking for work.
(e) No; I’m too young to work/still in school/live with my parents.
11.) What is your highest level of education?
(a) Some high school.
(b) High school.
(c) Some college.
(d) Associate’s degree.
(e) Bachelor’s degree.
(f) Master’s or higher.
12.) If you have not completed your field of study, are you still studying or did you drop out?
(a) I’ve completed my field of study.
(b) I’m still studying.
(c) I dropped out, but I plan to go back.
(d) I dropped out, but I have no plans to go back.
Remember, you can answer all of these anonymously if you don’t want to vouchsafe these details with your name. I can’t even tell who you are if you choose to do so; you can just type in “Anonymous” for the name and put in a fake e-mail such as none@none.com. Everything passes through a proxy IP on a squid server, so you all look like the same IP address to me when you post anonymously - so there’s no fear that I’ll discuss your answers as associated to you.
My answers:
1.) a. 2.) b. 3.) g. 4.) b. 5.) i. 6.) a. 7.) c. 8.) e. 9.) c. 10.) a. 11.) d with a bit of e, as I have an associate’s but I’ve studied towards a bachelor’s. 12.) kind of b, kind of c, since I’ve completed one degree but want to return to finish another.
To start off the morning, Kaine won the 1,500 comments contest and is now the proud owner of a horribly pink 1GB Sandisk Sansa MP3 player with FM tuner and voice recording capabilities. I’m not sure if that’s a good thing or a bad thing, but Kaine, I’ll be e-mailing you (I owe you one anyway, and got a little sidetracked) regarding where you want the MP3 player sent. Poor Lessa; missed it by just one.
This weekend, we’ll be having a comment party. Yes, a comment party, as weird as that bloody well sounds. The basic idea is this: at midnight CST on Friday, I’ll put up a post solely for the sake of commenting, explaining the full rules of the party…ish…thing. The purpose is to hit 100 comments to that post alone (comments to other posts won’t count) over the course of the weekend. You can’t just spam the hell out of the post, but like I said, the post itself will explain the rules. Whoever gets the 100th post will get a t-shirt in the Cafepress style of their choice with either the pink/blue or red/blue design posted in yesterday’s comic. There may be a runner-up prize for #101. I’d say if we really wanted to, we could hit 100 posts in one day; hell, if Hikaru and I start bickering, we can manage 50 of those ourselves in just a few hours.
Moving on to the usual mini-discussions of news that occur when Adri just isn’t in the mood for a high-blood-pressure sermon:
Arthritic, sporty, gay? Your finger ratio may tell you: Although it’s pretty common knowledge that apparently the lengths of your fingers in relation to each other can determine whether or not you’re good at math, researchers have also found a correlation between various other traits and the lengths of particular fingers. Long ring fingers indicate a likelihood for osteoarthritis; “male” finger ratios hint at lesbianism. I keep surveying my hands looking for “female” finger ratios to see if that’s supposed to be an indicator of my status as a fabulous king (one queen comment and I skin you) of gay snark. Funny how this one finger in the middle keeps popping up a bit higher than the others…
Gay bar’s straight bouncer wins discrimination suit: A straight woman who worked as a bouncer in a UK gay bar often dealt with harassing comments about her sexuality - a reversal of the usual harassment of homosexuals. She also claims she was fired for it and that her employer often called her a “breeder”; while the court determined that her firing had nothing to do with her sexuality, she was still awarded a settlement for facing discrimination in the workplace - and right well she should be. I still don’t know where we get this idea that because some heterosexuals are nasty to us, that gives us the right to behave in an equally bigoted, discriminatory fashion towards them. Two wrongs don’t make a right, more cliched BS, blah blah, the point is that no one’s sexuality gives anyone the right to behave like a complete douche towards them. It’s not all right to place the shoe on the other foot and “show them how it feels”. It just makes you as bad as the people that you mock and loathe.
Wasn’t asked, told anyway: In a refreshing change, a gay servicemember (who, if you follow the link, is not only brave but quite attractive) came out on public television and wasn’t in any way rebuked or confronted about it by his unit or his commanding officers - and he’s discovered that he’s not alone. Hundreds of gay servicemembers serve active duty with their sexuality fully known by their units. Their fellow servicemembers just don’t care. Out in the field, one’s sexuality doesn’t matter. What matters is capability, and whether or not the people in your unit can put their skills to use saving your life and the lives of the soldiers and civilians around you. Too many highly skilled individuals with knowledge and experience that could be valuable in avoiding bloodshed have been barred from service for the most idiotic reasons - the top reason being that the Pentagon somehow thinks that open homosexuality in the military will foster dissent in the ranks.
I feel as if I should write something profound this morning, and yet I’ve got nothing - and I’m out of Seagram’s. Anyone can be profound after a few shots of Seagram’s. It’s a pretty slow gay news day, there’s no point in spending more time hashing through the same recycled political points (just have the bloody election already; we’re damned either way) and the most interesting thing I’ve stumbled across lately has been some wanker in a local Iowa newspaper claiming that a barely-gay film on ABC ruined family TV on Christmas. The comments are priceless (and a little disjointed, but it’s Iowa, after all).
Yeah. Merry Christmas, we dragged your head out of the sand for you; no need to thank us. Gay people exist. We’re a part of the population, which means there’s going to be a percentage of representation on television - especially when television struggles to reflect real life. No one’s trying to force anything on anyone. You can’t close your eyes and wish your gay next-door-neighbor away. At least on TV you can change the channel, so stop your griping and use your thumb for more than a navel cork. Jerk.
Anyway. It’s been a little while since I’ve done an “Ask Adri” question, and I’d saved this one for a slow day when one might need some amusement. I certainly hope the person who wrote it isn’t serious, but either way, I’m going to take a stab at it.
hi Adri I really like your comic
I like to read yaoi slashfic
But its weird
No one uzes lube
Is that true
Do gays use lube
Sweet Pea
Kind of reads like a weird kind of haiku or tanka, doesn’t it?
Sweetie, here’s your first problem: you’re reading gay porn written by girls. Specifically by girls in their late teens and mid-twenties who’ve probably never taken it up the back door (or the front door, most likely) and thus have no idea how the mechanics of that work. I know there’s a huge craze in the female-dominated yaoi fandom; I used to help fuel it with a yaoi webcomic. (If you don’t know what yaoi is, have a gander here.) I know that porn written by girls is more appealing. It has plot, characterization, and descriptions of sex that don’t involve words like “sloppy”, “squishing”, “gaping”, “gushing”, and…well, I’ll spare you the rest.
But to dispel a few illusions created by yaoi fanfiction and slashfiction: the bum does not self-lubricate. It is not a magical transformative thing that instantly takes on properties of the vagina at convenient moments when the bumsexing is about to occur.
Water is not lube. Saliva is not lube. Blood is not lube. Cooking oil is not lube. And for all that’s holy, unholy, and somewhere in between, soap of any kind is not lube. Stuff a bar of soap up your nose until your mucosae rip, then give your nostrils a good swabbing with Palmolive before jamming a finger in and out of there a few dozen times at rapid speed. Tell me how good it feels, eh?
With that said, yes, real gay sex does involve lube (unless you’re dealing with an idiot or a masochist). There’s KY Jelly, Platinum Wet Glide, various body oils that do dual duty, pre-lubricated condoms, the list goes on. It’s not an option. It’s a necessity. He may say “oh, I like it rough” now, but he won’t be liking it so rough when his doctor is giving him a prostate exam and lecturing him about the damage done to his rectal tissue. Not to mention that penetration isn’t particularly easy without lubricant and preparation, and it’s not just uncomfortable for the recipient. Friction is a scabies-ridden b*tch.
Real gay sex is not as pretty as the fiction makes it seem. No sex is as pretty as fiction makes it seem. Sex is messy, crude, awkward, and funny as hell no matter the gender of those involved; human beings are some oddly-put-together things, and when you’re trying to cram two or more naked bodies together in certain ways the limbs start going everywhere like you’re doing the wild pony with a Gumby doll. Funny thing is if you keep a sense of humor about it and just relax…sometimes you find something even better than the fiction. It may still be messy, it may not be perfect, but there’ll be something there in that wild meeting of bodies and the hiss of skin on skin that makes it not matter anymore, because every touch is just right and it’s hard to care about how silly you both look when you can’t even manage to think for the distraction of each sensation.
I’d like to see any virgin-written fanfiction capture that.
Your 2.5mL of silicone-based lifesaver,
~Adri
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Most gays and lesbians rarely know our sexual orientation right off the bat, and it’s not so strange that the majority of us fumbled around with opposite-sex partners - whether briefly or in prolonged relationships - before slowly finding our way. Most of us have one or more opposite-sex exes in our histories…but sometimes they won’t stay comfortably in the past.
When I was eighteen, I had my first long-term girlfriend. By that time I’d pretty much figured out that I was gay, maybe with a few of those fluid overtones to make me occasionally bisexual - but sometimes attraction doesn’t limit itself to physical attributes. I made friends with a girl with whom I had a great deal in common, back then: similar interests, similar activities, similar hobbies, and the bonding factor of being able to gripe about the difficulty of university studies. We had a great deal of fun together. Not only that, but I was uncertain enough in my confidence about my sexuality that I was willing to be swayed towards women - perhaps hoping to alleviate a secret shame that I’ve since discarded utterly. Somehow common ground progressed to flirting, flirting progressed to more…and suddenly I had a girlfriend.
The problems, surprisingly, didn’t begin with a lack of attraction to her naughty bits. The problems came with discovering other things we had in common: nasty tempers and vituperative mean streaks that made every small argument turn into a vicious catfight that didn’t end until we were both bleeding heavily from a number of proverbial mortal wounds. The fact that my (admittedly somewhat forced) physical interest in her waned the more we fought only made the fights worse, and finally I had to cut it off. I had to tell her that I couldn’t do this; we were too incompatible personally, beyond the point that the relationship pretty much confirmed that yes, I’m 99% gay and unfortunately she didn’t fit into that rare 1%.
She lost it like Mariah Carey finding out she didn’t get top billing.
I wish we could have ended it cleanly, with no prolonged hard feelings. That was rather naive of me, in truth. The next several months after the breakup consisted of constant attacks over what I’d “done to her”, pleas, accusations that I had used her, even threats. You can imagine that promises to show up at my front door with a dozen roses and a butcher knife didn’t make me feel particularly inclined to make amends. I’d always known she was a little mental, but until then it was just cute quirks; I had no idea she had mental malfunctions severe enough to make Hannibal Lecter look like Rainbow Brite. The entire fiasco divided our friends, with most of them taking her side because she’d managed to demonize me utterly.
Since I was to be demonized anyway, I went ahead and let myself be the biggest bastard I know how to be (and trust me, that’s one big pile of bastardry); might as well live up to their expectations, right? Anything to get her off my back; anything to make her hate me enough to just…leave me alone. It worked, after another month or so in which I inflicted every verbal cruelty on her that I could to discourage contact. I’m not proud of my behavior or even of who I was back then, but it was a matter of desperation.
So why, now, is she still a part of my life?
I wish I had an easy answer to that.
I suppose part of it is guilt. We didn’t talk for years. Wounds healed; we both matured a great deal, and I at least learned to keep more of a leash on my temper and my acid tongue. She turned to lesbianism; I was the last man she ever tried anything with. When we ran into each other again, we approached each other on guarded terms, wary of each other (with me halfway wondering if she was going to pull a butcher knife out of her purse). Eventually we were able to talk, apologize for our reprehensible behavior in the past, and come to terms with how our relationship ended. I was relieved that she seemed calmer, less unstable; she was relieved that I’d put the venom away, sheathed the claws, and wasn’t such an a**. Over time we even began to develop a tentative friendship.
And I found out that she really hadn’t changed at all.
Every aspect of our friendship revolved around compensating for “what I’d done to her”, and she had a set list of expectations that her friends all had to adhere to in order to be considered “good” friends. Not surprisingly, that list and her subsequent drama fits over meeting the minimum requirements have lost her more than one friend. Pointing out to her that part of friendship is wanting to do things for your friends without expectations or demands…well, that was a near-suicidal mistake. It didn’t help that she threw everything I’d said years ago back in my face. I didn’t even remember saying those things; I’m a guy, for hell’s sake. I don’t remember what I had for dinner last week, let alone something I said years ago. When a fight’s over, it’s over. I forget about it. She, obviously, didn’t. Attempts to nudge her towards seeking help in coping with her issues met with furious responses followed by more guilt trips.
So eventually I started to distance myself again - only this time, the guilt went deeper and I still couldn’t let go entirely. I’ve made her like this, I thought to myself, likely with a bit too much hubris. It’s my fault she’s this insecure and insane, because I dug her insecurities deeper when I broke up with her. I limited contact to brief conversations here and there every few months and let her friend me on LiveJournal, but filtered her out of most of my entries. I still read her entries now and then, and it’s the same old song: nobody loves me enough to dance to my tune, I hate everyone, people suck, my life is awful and it’s all someone else’s fault. Sometimes, honestly, she disgusts me - but mostly, I feel sorry for her. Beyond certain family members of mine she’s the most emotionally abusive person I’ve ever known, but there’s a certain lonely desperation to it that makes me rather sad.
And yet slowly, I’m starting to break away more and more. Sometimes your opposite-sex ex can turn into one of the best friends you’ve ever had; sometimes you just need to cut loose, both for your sake and for theirs. Eventually I’ll be able to walk away from her completely. A recent fiasco is helping me make the separation and get over my guilt; she was staying here in Houston for a while as part of a short-term job, and for some reason she didn’t bother making plans to go home when the job was over…and was somehow surprised when she suddenly had no more job-sponsored housing and was left wondering where to go. She contacted me, acting like she was desperate for somewhere to stay and if I didn’t let her live with me she’d be on the street, penniless and living out of her car (why she didn’t drive said car home, I don’t know).
I…panicked. I really did. No matter how much anyone changes, you never forget threats of a butcher knife; I’d rather share my space with a few thousand angry scorpions than live with her. I told her that I couldn’t, because if anyone who isn’t on my lease stays here for more than three days I’ll be evicted (that’s the truth, actually), and frantically started making phone calls looking to see if I could find her an affordable hostel or a friend who wouldn’t mind a couch-guest for a few days until she got herself sorted enough to go back home. I even offered to give her some money to help make sure she’d be all right, even though I was mostly broke at the time. The whole time she guilt-tripped me over saying no, reminding me of how bad her situation was and making me feel like a total jerk for not wanting her in my home. The offers of money were conveniently ignored even though she could have used it for food, hotel or hostel fare, gas money, etc.
It turned out she was already in a rather nice hostel, and had other people who were perfectly willing to let her stay with them. She also had money, and more due in a few days. She was just manipulating me, pretty much. Exaggerating, most likely to gain sympathy.
I haven’t spoken to her since.
If I’m lucky, I may never have to speak to her again - though that would be the coward’s way out. Eventually I will have to take the last steps to sever ties, and make it concretely clear that she’s not welcome in my life. Part of me doesn’t want to face that; that’s why I’ve avoided it for so long, as visits from the Drama Llama tend to leave me with headaches that last for weeks (and raggedly chewed boxer-briefs, for it’s well-known that the Drama Llama has an appetite for underwear). There’s also that lingering guilt, but it’s finally starting to fade enough that I can end what was an unhealthy relationship to start with…for both of us.
Despite being wary of her, I don’t hate her. She’s got a number of issues, and I hope she manages to work them out and finally find a way to be happy without depending on others to make that happiness for her (or else). But I can’t continue to let her stress me out and make her misery into my misery. People in my family already grey prematurely; I don’t need her accelerating the process.
So in the end, what was the point of this meandering story? I suppose to share an experience that I know others out there have been through, in the uncertain, blind fumble to find their way. Many gays and lesbians end up forming toxic, guilt-centered relationships of this sort, that do nothing but drain them and foster unhealthy and even obsessive behavior patterns. It’s happened to me, and I’m at fault for letting the situation get even worse than it had to be.
If you’re in a relationship like this, you’re not alone - and I suppose you should take my tale as a precaution. Learn to walk away, and learn that you can’t take blame for someone else’s issues. They will tell you that those issues are your fault, but really, you’re just a target. It’s okay to sever ties with that person, and to not take responsibility for the harm that they would have caused themselves and others with or without you.
I am a geek. I’ve said it before, and I’ll say it again. I love books, I love computers, I love programming, and I spent half this past weekend intensively researching formation of pillow lava and submarine lava tubes along fissures on the mid-Atlantic ridge - ostensibly as background information for a story idea, but after a while I forgot about the story out of fascination with the subject matter. I read Slashdot, I can write my own applications in Flash, and discussions of nanotechnology in crystal solar cells and aberrant prion structures can turn me on faster than a gyrating Chippendale covered in chocolate sauce. Tinkering with the building blocks of our world and ourselves just sends little thrills of pleasure down my spine. Obviously, scientific advancement and discovery don’t make me uncomfortable.
What makes me uncomfortable is the intentions not only of those who make the discoveries, but of those who are given the information and the power to make use of it.
So you can imagine that I was at once fascinated and disturbed to read that scientists have discovered how to use drugs to turn homosexuality on and off within a matter of hours - in fruit flies, mind you, not in humans. I’ve long been a proponent of some kind of biological explanation for homosexuality, whether it’s genetic or a more complex combination of factors resulting from chemical adaptations to the environment, making it as much a physical trait as the color of your eyes or the tendency to grey early around the temples. While fruit flies and humans aren’t exactly the same, the finding that fruit flies’ sexuality is affected by a gene they called “genderblind” and the transportation of a neurotransmitter called glutamate is still a major leap. Chemically altering the levels of glutamate changed the flies’ sexuality by changing how they react to the scents of pheromones. If the same can be said of humans and other animals, then we’ve helped to narrow down the biological source of homosexuality. Great; conclusive proof against homosexuality as a sin or lifestyle choice.
What bothers me is what can be done with this. On one hand, you have to experiment with being able to artificially create and remove biological homosexuality in order to prove that it even is biological, so of course I wouldn’t assume that the scientists involved in the experiments have some kind ulterior motive. They’re trying to understand the nature of homosexuality, nothing more. What I worry about is commercial and private interests pouncing on this. There are enough homophobic people in positions of corporate and political power in this country, people who view homosexuality as a disease, that they could easily take this finding as proof that homosexuality is a defect that can and must be “cured”. It makes me shudder to think of drugs designed to change the synaptic response to glutamate, marketed loudly as the “gay cure” and administered indiscriminately to humans to fix their “defect”. The very discovery is a new weapon for ex-gay ministries to use to seduce people into thinking that they even need to be cured.
Am I doomsaying and predicting the end of the world as we know it? No. This isn’t the Marvel universe, and we’re not going to be rounded up in mutant concentration camps and administered cures for our “genetic aberration” (I told you I was a geek). All I’m doing is raising a note of concern that should be present in all scientific and medical discoveries: concern for the ethical use of findings, and awareness that all discoveries, no matter how innocent, can be misused by those with the wrong intent. It’s a fancy way of saying that I don’t trust people, especially people in power.
What I’m saying is to be aware. You’d be surprised at the things your government does when they think you aren’t looking, such as pushing legislation that could allow government copyright agencies to seize and sell your property on the suspicion of copyright violation, without trial and without recompense - fully overriding due process and protections against unlawful search and seizure, much the same as civil forfeiture in drug possession cases. No, that’s not farfetched speculation of what could happen. That’s an actual bill in the works. The United States government will do anything its people will let it get away with, often with the encouragement of privately owned corporations and religious organizations - even if often, people only “let” things happen by being passive, by not acting, by not even knowing what’s going on until it’s too late.
Don’t be passive. Keep your eyes open. Homosexuality is a hot issue, a divisive issue, and can draw focused attention from legislators. There’s no cause for outright paranoia; this isn’t 1984 and while yes, Big Brother is watching, Big Brother isn’t all-powerful. It’s up to the citizens to protect their rights before they’re taken away - and part of protecting your own rights is being informed. Be aware of what’s happening around you, and how it affects you. Be aware of the ethical accountability of all factions of government, science, medicine, capitalist enterprise - so that when the time comes to speak for yourself, you can.
After all, it’s hard to protest something when you aren’t even aware of it until it’s done.
As many of you know, yesterday was the Transgender Day of Remembrance, honoring the memories of transpeople killed because of their gender identity and violence against transpeople in general. I suppose it might seem a little trite when transfolk were conveniently left behind during the vote on ENDA, but it’s still important to show respect for transpeople nonetheless; a little extra recognition on one day can’t erase the prejudice they put up with year-round, but it can help to ease the sting just a little. I have several trans friends, and they held their own little TDR party to share their war stories of transition, their triumphs, and the overall experience with their friends, both gay and straight. (I ended up carrying one of them home drunk last night, poor guy).
I find it interesting, then, that this story cropped up in the news yesterday, right on the day of remembrance:
(Riverdale, Georgia) Two people who lost to a transgender candidate for a seat on the Riverdale council claim Michelle Bruce committed election fraud by claiming “to be female.”
Bruce, who has never hidden that she is transgender was the incumbent in the Nov. 6 election for the Riverdale, Georgia City Council. She was the top vote-getter and advances to a runoff election next month.
But failed candidates Georgia Fuller and Stanley Harris have asked a judge to disqualify Bruce from the runoff.
[…]In their petition to the court Fuller and Harris refer to Bruce as “Michael Bruce” and ask the court to nullify the Nov. 6 results. […] The paper reported that Bruce’s voter registration, her notice of candidacy and her driver’s license all identify her as Michelle Bruce, a white female.
She declined to say if she had had sex reassignment surgery.
“That’s private,” she told the paper. “The people don’t care about it.”
Now…correct me if I’m wrong, but it’s only fraud if there’s deliberate deception involved, and deliberate intent to defraud someone by gaining from their loss. The loss vs. gain argument doesn’t even work here because in an election, there’ll always be one winner and one or more losers, so of course the winner will gain from their loss. Michelle Bruce didn’t deceive anyone; not only is she legally recognized as female, but she was even open with voters about the fact that she’s transgendered.
I don’t see fraud here. I see two bitter losers latching on to something they think they can use to turn the tide in their favor. I also see a great deal of disrespect for Michelle and her transition, by referring to her as “Michael”. It rather reminds me of someone at my friend Karl’s job, who insists on referring to him as “Kelly” and who will be as nasty as possible about it. Fuller and Harris lost to the better - or at least the most popular - candidate, and lost fairly. They should just accept that gracefully, rather than launching an attack because they think Michelle Bruce somehow deceived voters.
Granted, the issue of deception can be a tricky one where transgenders are concerned, because much of the general public doesn’t understand the concept of gender identity and its differences from sexual identity. They view crossdressing as a sexual fetish that often has to do with being gay, when that’s hardly the case. I recall that not too long ago a transwoman who’d been living happily with her husband for many years was arrested because her neighbors found out she was trans, and called the police to have her arrested for attempting to deceive and defraud the community. To members of the GBLTQ community who accept transpeople and understand exactly why they need to act on their gender identity to live in a way that’s most comfortable for them, the entire notion of deception and fraud seems utterly ridiculous.
To the general public, who will go on complete mental lockdown if you ask them to try to reconcile a gender identity the total opposite of one’s anatomy, it’s not so ridiculous at all.
They don’t even mean to be malicious. Another friend of mine, Charles, deals with this on a regular basis at work. He’s pre-op, FtM, taking hormones. He looks very masculine, grows a beard, everything. Underneath his clothing, though, he wears a binder to flatten his breasts. He still has female anatomy, but to anyone who knows him, he’s very much a man. When he was first hired, the HR manager was made aware of the situation and she did her best to understand, and even if she didn’t she was at least very nice about making sure that no one else knew anything about it and he was hired on as Charles, not as Cheryl. One day he was outed in the employee bathroom, though…and once everyone knew he had female anatomy, they immediately began referring to him as “she” and “her”.
And they weren’t even trying to be mean. That’s just the way they’re conditioned; female anatomy means female, male anatomy means male, and anything else is just all in your head and should be dismissed. It’s almost a battle of generations, as current and upcoming generations tend to understand gender identity far more than their elders. We understand why it’s a matter of respect to accept transgendered people as their chosen identity rather than by their anatomy, because they couldn’t help the anatomy they were born with and in many cases either can’t afford to change it or, in the case of many FtMs, have less than desirable surgical options available and thus choose to make do with what they have. A lot of people don’t see that. They just say that you can’t possibly call yourself a woman or a man when you have the anatomy of the opposite sex.
Still, sometimes people can be educated into understanding. Many transpeople have had success educating their parents, so all hope isn’t lost. Even people like Fuller and Harris can be educated, if they’ll just listen and try to understand. It just takes time, patience, and a little understanding of your own.
And cases like these remind me of just why it’s so important that those of us who do understand show respect to our trans friends, so they know that there are those who do support them and appreciate them, and will help to hold them up while they deal with those who can’t.
Every day we hear stories of the pain caused by discrimination and prejudice against the gay and lesbian community. The news is filled with them: stories of families broken, friendships abandoned, jobs lost, public and private humiliation, personal injury…sometimes even lives lost. We’ve all read the stories. We’ve all been those stories, at one point or another. Some of us live them every day; some of us have managed to insulate ourselves until it’s a far-distant thing that we look upon with pity and sorrow. And sometimes…sometimes, those stories come knocking on our doorsteps.
A close friend of mine - we’ll call her Mirela for the sake of privacy - is dealing with her own story right now, and dreading its outcome. Mirela is a lesbian, and her family has always had trouble coping with that. Her father is openly derisive, while her mother has struggled to accept her and reconcile the fact that her daughter is a lesbian with her own personal beliefs. Mirela’s mother is also a teacher at the Catholic school where Mirela endured a miserable nine years as an outcast - the unpopular girl; the girl who was snickered about because she didn’t have the right hair or jeans or shoes; the girl who always hid her nose in a book so she wouldn’t have to hear about the things the other girls were doing without her, and the activities she was excluded from. I know how she felt; I was that boy, Catholic school and all.
Now, though, Mirela is a college student ready to start her career; over the years I’ve watched her fight through so many insecurities and difficulties and always come out strong and fighting on the other side of every battle. She’s got a wonderful girlfriend now, and Mirela isn’t at all ashamed to be open about her sexuality. She even has a LGBT support banner on her formerly public MySpace page.
I say formerly, because now she’s had to set it on private to try to avoid embarrassing her mother - but the damage has already been done.
Sometimes all it takes is one little thing to utterly change the flavor of your life. In this case that one little thing was Mirela’s mother bringing up Mirela’s MySpace page in a class of 13-year-old girls, to demonstrate just how public personal information can be so the girls understand the dangers they pose to themselves by posting their pictures and information on the site. Mirela’s mother ended up becoming the lesson as the girls burst into giggles at the sight of the LGBT banner - and now the woman has become the laughingstock of the entire class. Even worse, Mirela has become the laughingstock of the school for the second time in her life, when she’d thought she’d be able to leave that place behind forever. All of this just because she’s the teacher’s daughter, and she’s a lesbian.
Mirela’s mother has to deal with that every day, now. The whispers; the snickers; the looks. The loss of respect from her class. Even worse, there may be more severe repercussions, as word spreads to the parents. Mirela has had first-hand experience with how intolerant the parents who send their children to this school can be, and worries that her mother will face reprimand or may even lose her job if they decide that she might be a corrupting influence on her child. The hardest part for her to deal with, though, is that her mother might be ashamed of her - or if not ashamed of her, at the very least publicly shamed because of her. As hard as her mother has struggled to accept her, Mirela never wanted to bring public humiliation upon her, never wanted to do anything that might in any way embarrass her, but now it’s too late.
And all because of a group of small-minded children.
I don’t wholly blame the children. Mostly I blame the parents for not teaching them that another person’s sexuality isn’t something to be mocked or derided - but really, this is more indicative of a problem within society in general. Children will always be cruel towards those who are different; that’s just the way children are. But it wouldn’t have been such a big deal - and they wouldn’t be openly disrespecting an adult - if society hadn’t made it quite clear that hey, it’s perfectly all right to make fun of gays, lesbians, bisexuals, the transgendered…anyone who isn’t 100% hetero and fitting the norm. Derisive gay jokes are more common than derisive straight jokes and are among the first “taboo” things that children learn to snigger about behind their hands in the bathrooms and lunchrooms, as they try out words like “fag” and “fudgepacker” and, if they’re feeling really daring and dirty, “cocksucker” and “rugmuncher”. They’ll fling these words at each other as insults with no real idea of what they mean beyond the fact that they’re related to being gay, and being gay is both funny and worthy of ridicule.
Laying blame, though, doesn’t change what’s already happened - and doesn’t change that now Mirela’s relationship with her mother is once more strained as she carries what she feels is her burden for embarrassing her mother.
No one should ever have to be embarrassed by their sexuality, for any reason. No one should ever have to fear that their sexuality will create an uncomfortable situation for a relative or a friend, or that it might somehow reflect negatively on those in their personal circle. In an ideal world, this situation wouldn’t have even been an issue and those girls wouldn’t have batted an eyelash at the banner.
But this isn’t an ideal world. This is reality, and reality is an ugly thing that will only change if we work at it - if we educate one another, and practice the tolerance that we preach. One day we may reconcile social perceptions of homosexuality with the reality, and gain acceptance to the point where we’ll become nearly commonplace. That day is not today.
But with hope and hard work, it may be one day soon.
Sorry I’m so late updating today, kids. In a little personal (and yet at least topical to this site) TMI, I spent my early morning sending the boyfriend the dreaded Breakup Letter, making him the ex again for the second time in four years, even if I’m not quite sure he’s aware of it yet. I? I am going to happily enjoy being single for a long time. I go through about a man a year (better than a man a month), and I’m tired of it; besides, all I want is a normal guy, and it’s practically impossible to find one of those in the gay community. Trust me. I’ve tried. Anyway, I rather fancy the artful image of myself as the solitary, cynical writer, clove in one hand, drink in the other, and a stack of dog-eared manuscript pages on the desk in front of me while my glasses try to fall off my nose.
See? No such thing as a normal gay guy. [snrk]
Anyway. So I’m sure you’re not the slightest bit surprised to find out that hey, I wasn’t much in the mood for updating this morning. And I’m still not in the mood to go digging through the news for something to sermonize about. Instead, I feel like snarking on something a little.
Lately I’m noticing a growing trend in my site metrics: search strings that show that users are looking for a “gay quiz”. Not my Diva Quiz, but a quiz that will somehow analyze their personal habits, personality traits, and dress styles to tell them if they’re gay or lesbian. As if we somehow all share some uniform in style, habit, and personality. Really, a gay quiz should be horribly easy. And so now, without further ado, I present to you:
The Gay Quiz
1. Are you turned on by/attracted to members of the same sex, but not particularly affected by members of the opposite sex?
(a) No
(b) Yes
(c) I like both.
Answers Explained
If you answered (a): You’re straight. If you answered (b): You’re gay/lesbian. Wow, that was easy, wasn’t it? If you answered (c): You’re either bi or gifted with a strong libido that doesn’t care whose leg you hump as long as you find satisfaction.
Now was that really so bloody hard? No? Then why does anyone need a multi-question quiz for that? Hell, it even works if you’re transgendered, as I know the gender questions can get confusing because some people don’t quite get that you define your sexuality after you define your gender identity. If you’re FtM and you’re attracted to guys, you’re gay; attracted to girls, you’re straight (and woe on the person who calls you a lesbian). If you’re MtF and you’re attracted to women, you’re a lesbian; attracted to guys, you’re straight (and hell will befall the person who calls you a gay man). Still easy.
Now if you’re androgynous/genderqueer/asexual…um…you just are what you are. Have fun.
I’m gone. I’m thinking this is a weekend to curl up with a martini, the cat, and a good book. Enjoy your weekend, kiddos.
That’s right, today’s post deserves a cat-macro-ish title.
Del posted a link in a comment to yesterday’s post that was OT for the post, but perfect for a new post today. While I already discussed my take on it in the comments, I’d like to bring it up here for general discussion to get everyone else’s views on it as well as elaborate further myself now that I’ve had time to reread the article and think more on it. Here’s an excerpt:
Administrators at North Newton High School in Newton, Mass., have held a seminar for students that explained how to know they are homosexual, but banned parents from attending.
“It’s absolutely insane,” parent Brian Camenker, who also is chief of the Mass Resistance organization, said. “I met with the principal. She told me no parents are allowed. She said only by invitation. I asked, ‘Can I be invited.’ She said, ‘No.’”
The event, called “ToBeGlad Day,” was the school’s “Transgender Bisexual Gay Lesbian Awareness Day,” and students were given a pamphlet that explains what it means to be “gay,” tells students how they are supposed to know if they are “gay,” and responds to the question, “Will I ever have sex?”
News of the event comes just a day after WND reported on a case at Deerfield High School in Deerfield, Ill., where school officials ordered their 14-year-old freshman class into a “gay” indoctrination seminar, after having them sign a confidentiality agreement promising not to tell their parents.
“This is very, very scary stuff,” Camenker said. “The pamphlet also lists places kids can go to meet homosexuals. How would something like this affect a kid who might be going through a confused and vulnerable time in his life? Well … the school isn’t interested in what YOU think.”
The Newton principal, Jennifer Price, didn’t return a message WND left seeking a comment on the event.
Now, WND has a reputation for right-wing sensationalism and craziness on the levels of Fred Phelps, right down to the same wild speculation and biased accusations.
That said…there’s something wrong when I actually understand a little of where they’re coming from - even if I doubt the accuracy of their reported facts.
I don’t have any children of my own, but I’ve been in the role of the parent. I have a half-brother eighteen years my junior, from my father’s second marriage; I stayed with my father for a short while after university while I found a job so I could move out on my own, and during that time guess who took on the full-time role of parent while my father was at work and my stepmother was being useless parked in front of the Home Shopping Network? That’s right, me. Hell, to this day I’m the only one who can get the kid to clean his room, even if I have to do it long-distance.
If my little brother came home and told me that the school had him attend a mandatory seminar on homosexuality without my prior knowledge or told me they were holding a seminar but I wasn’t allowed to attend unless invited (I’m not going to get into the whole “deliberately hiding it from the parents” thing, as I doubt the accuracy of that), I’d be righteously pissed - and I’m gay.
It’s not the subject matter. It’s that the school would be choosing to educate a child that I helped raised on their view of sexuality without my prior notice, and without me knowing what’s being taught. It’s almost impossible to teach anything regarding human sexuality without bias in today’s political and social climate. Even worse, anything involving “no parents allowed” is going to make me nervous, because…well, what are they trying to hide? I don’t know if the children are being told that homosexuality is wrong, that it’s right, or that it’s a figment of their imaginations. Parents are very protective of their children, and are going to get their hackles in a bunch if you start taking control out of their hands that way. Showing an educational video in class is one thing; this is something wholly different.
I prefer to treat situations like this the way sex ed was treated in my high school. Parents were notified about the sex ed portion of the school year ahead of time, given pamphlets explaining the material that would be covered, and given permission slips granting their child permission to take the class. Most parents sign the permission slip and say “Go on, son, go learn about safe sex and STDs and the reproductive cycle. If you have any questions later, ask me, we’ll sort it out.” Some people don’t agree with what’s taught, or would rather teach their children themselves. They don’t sign the permission slip, and the kids sit out in study hall. The choice is there, giving parents control over how their children are raised.
It’s a noble idea to try to indoctrinate children into understanding and accepting homosexuality in themselves and in others. But if even a fraction of that article is true, then the schools mentioned went about it in entirely the wrong way. It’s basically taking advantage of a captive audience to push your agenda, and how the hell does that set a good example? This is the wrong political climate for that. Give us a decade or more of progress and tolerance and such educational assemblies might even become a mandatory standard, something I’d actually like to see. But right now? It doesn’t take a genius to see that taking that route is just asking for trouble and adding to the negative publicity we already get. How much common sense does it take to understand the concepts of tact, consideration, subtlety, and the old “slow and steady” adage?
Continuing my “I refuse to rant about the news because I don’t want to spoil my mood” trend this week, I’d like to tell you guys the little story that I mentioned in yesterday’s post. Yesterday we talked about Chelsea’s father; today we’re going to talk about mine. I’m going to get a bit personal, but I’ve done that before. I’m probably going to embarrass the hell out of my family, but I’ve done that before, too. And I’m going to embarrass myself a little, but…well…that’s definitely nothing new.
I love my father dearly; I really do. I love both my parents; I’ve just always had problems getting along with my mother, and went through a period where we didn’t speak for almost five years until Hurricane Katrina scared my butt silly and had me thinking she might be dead. We’re only now starting to deal with each other as adults, rather than snarling at each other like twelve-year-old girls fighting over a Hello Kitty handbag.
My Dad, though…we’ve always gotten along. He’s the quiet type, says little but thinks a hell of a lot, has a bit of an obsession with Billy Bob Thornton (Slingblade) and sometimes acts a little too much like him. He’s the kind of guy you can sit on a back porch with for hours, drinking a beer or two and quite comfortably not saying a damned word to each other. Just watching the mosquitos, watching the bayou, watching the Louisiana sky fade from a hard blue-white shell to a soft, deep rose that bleeds into twilight like watercolors running together.
It’s probably no big surprise that when I had The Talk with my parents about my sexuality, I was more comfortable telling my father than my mother. Even so, it wasn’t easy; first I had to get them to actually listen to me because they really didn’t want to know and deal with the whole “having a gay child” problem, and it was a long time before things settled down and my mother stopped nitpicking at me and making me feel like crap about it. My mother and I still have some small tiffs about it, though overall she tries to be supportive now. My father, in the end, took the news the same way he takes everything: quietly and calmly, thinking it over for a while before saying anything. In the end he told me if that’s what makes me happy then it’s my life, and I’m still his son and he loves me - and that’s been his stance ever since. I was and still am grateful.
Nonetheless, even now they still have those talks with each other. Those talks where they talk about me and my sexuality and ask where they went wrong, not really understanding that my sexuality has nothing to do with them or how they raised me, and I’d have been gay whether they abused me (they didn’t) or if we were the bloody effin’ Cleaver family - or even the bloody effin’ Addams family. They also can’t get this “wrong” concept out of their heads, but…they’re trying. [deep sigh] They’re trying as best they can, bless their nappy little heads.
Still, I wasn’t really surprised when, during a phone conversation with my mother the other day, she mentioned that she and Dad recently had another one of their little talks about “where did we go wrong with Adrien?”. In between making a few comments about my sexuality that set my teeth on edge (not out of malice, just unfamiliarity/ignorance), she started to tell me something that my father had said while a few beers under - then abruptly cut herself off. As blunt as my mother is, I should have taken that as a sign that no, I really didn’t want to know what my father said. She even said that I didn’t want to know.
In hindsight, I think she was right.
I finally pried it out of her, and when I did, I couldn’t believe that those words had come out of my quiet, slow-speaking, even-tempered father’s mouth.
“The only reason that boy’s gay is ’cause he ain’t had a good f***.”
…
Um.
Dad?
No.
I don’t think I’d ever really realized just how old-fashioned my father is, until that moment.
And I don’t think I’ve ever been more disgusted with my father in my life.
At first I was horribly angry when I heard that. One, I didn’t think my father was the kind of person to think like that even when drunk (that’s a Mel Gibson cop-out anyway, and we’ve all heard variations on the adage that alcohol makes a man honest), so I was horribly disappointed in him. Two, what does he know about my sex life and my experiences? I don’t talk about sex with my parents, unless my mother’s asking me uncomfortable probing questions and I give her just a touch too much detail to get her to shut up. It’s just not done, not where I come from. Talking about your sexual exploits and experimentations with your parents? Totally not on.
So my mother and father don’t know that yes, I experimented a little trying to get myself sorted out. Yes, I even tried being with girls to see if I liked it, and maybe I was just confused. And yes, Dad, I have in fact had many absolutely stellar f***s.
They just haven’t been with women.
I’m not attracted to women, and sex with a woman isn’t going to change that. It horrifies and hurts me to think my father would even think that way. Last I checked (now granted, I don’t spend much time rooting around down there), labia don’t secrete magical straight-making pixie dust that causes all men who come into contact with them to suddenly crave women - just like sampling a little cock can’t automatically make a lesbian want men. (Actually, it’s probably just going to make her want women even more. A lot of things come out of the tip of a cock, but they’re quite a bit messier and not nearly as pretty as pixie dust, and I doubt a lesbian’s going to find those things particularly enticing.)
To me, my father sounded just like your average chauvanistic straight male who will happily leer at a lesbian and tell her that the only reason she likes women is because she hasn’t met the right man to make her feel like a real woman, nudge-nudge wink-wink.
Yyyeah. Ha. No. I really don’t think so. Ladies? You want to chime in
Why are lesbian and bisexual women so into gay porn? Granted, generally not the hardcore stuff; it’s more written, or artwork, or even artistic photographs. (I’m not even into the hardcore stuff; porn just makes me giggle. Those faces they make…gods, I hope I don’t look that stupid during sex.) I kind of get it when it’s straight women; it’s the (more tasteful) equivalent of straight men getting their rocks off on lesbian porn, without the drool, grunting, and inevitable need for a wet wipe.
This has been your “god I need sleep” post for the day.
