Before I knew what a fag was, I knew I didn’t want to be one. I was very clear about that. I made sure everyone knew that I was no fag.
Eight years old at a new school, and it was the hot word of autumn. Every time I screwed up or said something stupid: “What are you, a fag?” No way! In the showers after basketball, “Stay away from Wilson – he’s a fag!” I want you to know, I kept my distance from Wilson, for weeks. I still hadn’t figured out what a fag was, but you couldn’t be too careful in those days. It could have been something like a vampire, and vampires really scared me. Thank God I didn’t sit next to Wilson in class.
Gradually, bit by bit, I was informed by the wisdom of the savvier kids. They had parts of the puzzle to share, in authoritative tones. I pieced it together. A fag was someone who wanted to put his you-know-what in your you-know-where. (!) I was having none of that.
Strange in retrospect is that, at the time, I didn’t know where my own you-know-what was actually supposed to go, when approved by God, the government and my Mom.
I was quite wary of fags for a number of years, because they could sneak up on you in the subway, or at the orthodontist’s, and I didn’t know what they looked like. I guessed they had a funny look on their faces. Maybe wore perfume. Fortunately, my olfactory senses were young and keen, and kept me successfully out of the orbit of perfume-wearing, funny-look-on-faces men. I successfully avoided falling victim to any fags. My you-know-where remained safe.
I’m older now, and I know more about fags. They’re not like vampires, silly. Ha, ha. No. And they don’t seem to wear perfume, typically. And they are good at keeping their facial expressions unremarkable by non-fag standards.
So I decided to ask myself why some of my fellow penis owners still seem to have a bit of a problem with the fags. What makes them different from normal men?
· Men like sports. Do fags like sports? The ones I know root for the same teams I do. And there’s this one fag who, if you give him more than one second at the top of the key, he’ll sink it every time.
· Men like food. Well, the fags I know seem to know more about food than I do. I think that’s pretty good, matter of fact.
· Men like tech toys. I have to tell you, the fags I know got their Tivos, Blackberries and Bose Noise-Canceling Headphones around the same time I did.
· Men like sex. A lot. As much as they can get. Men scheme and plan and occasionally behave badly, in order to achieve sex. Fags… seriously, now, I’m having trouble seeing a lot of difference here.
You can tell I’ve put some thought into this.
I’ve reached a conclusion. This may be controversial, but please remember that science doesn’t lie.
Fags are men. They’re us. They may want to put their you-know-what into what appears to me to be the wrong you-know-where, but that’s just not enough of a distinction to matter.
I’m so glad I’m not eight anymore, and was able to figure this whole thing out.
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Many of them cry harder at sad songs than I do. The biggest difference I can tell you is that they will ALWAYS tell a woman if her ass looks fat in jeans. And a straight woman will hug him for that and never make him sleep on the couch or hold him hostage to her silence for his honesty.
Best of all, gay men will never try to poke you in the middle of the back in the middle of the night with their you-know-what as a feeble attempt at an apology. They know better than that. They apologize with words, deeds and actions. This is what sets them apart from the straight men who park on the opposite side of the street, as it were.
I'm going to go out on a limb here. Maybe try spending the night with a man who knows how to find your you-know-where with his you-know-what? Hint: It's not in the middle of the lady's back.
(grin)
I can't think of a better practical demonstration of "nonplussed".
"You know, you're gay."
"No, I'm not."
"Okay, but I think we'll be having a talk pretty soon."
"No, really, we won't."
"You protest too much."
"Aaarrgh."
and ;p I'm bi by the way, you could have offered, but I guess you are just too scared off by my brilliance and beauty
One of the funnier things to happen in my life was when I sang "Sorry/Grateful" from "Company" at a cast party for my theatre group away back in the '70s and one of the gay guys told me (with a definite grin and wink) that if the poster boy for straight (I was 18 at the time) could like musicals, there was hope for the world. I think that brought it home at a tender age.
Who knows what goes on in the minds of the regressive louts that can't get past the wheres and the whats its.
Most excellent post, my good Man Talk
As opposed to being a fagnet, I've always been a faghag. I love gay guys. I especially love bitchy queens, as long as they're not being bitchy at me.
Oh- as a gay guy from Detroit; gay dudes also know alot about cars! I don't at all, but most gays I know understand how that thing-a-ma-jig needs that tweek-a-doodle just at the right speed without faltering on the clutch! And yes that's car talk- not bed talk! Although, come to think of it....
Now, a gay guy that can shoot hoops? Not such a draw for me.
I do, however, like pretty much just about every gay "type" that's ever been stereotyped, with the exception of the woman-hater gay guy. I've met a few of them and wow, it's toxic just breathing the same air.
Fat hairy men like me are called Bears. So whenever I am around my moms friend everyone calls my bear. Gay community lingo... I may have to post on it.
I like food. Seriously. I come from a culture where food is love. And I make a rack of lamb that you would seriously die for. I like tech toys. I probably got my bose headphones and iPod BEFORE you and your friends did. And I read the manuals cover to cover and know how to use them. And I like sex. I have a happy, happy husband because he has a woman who not only doesn't turn it down, but very often initiates.
And I do not think I am all that remarkable as a woman. I know I'm not the only one like me....so really, fags, straight, man, woman, the differences are fewer than the similarities quite frankly.
Same with the word "fag".
When I started my engineering course, I was staying with about 20 other girls in a large house. After some time one of the girls let the rest of us know that she was a lesbian. This created a panic situation in the house which was aggravated when she mentioned that one of the inmates was particularly beautiful. We positively avoided her and gossiped about her behind her back. I don't remember talking to her alone even once.
I had to move to another city as I was granted admission to a govt. college which meant highly subsidised fees and with that I lost all contact with my ex-housemates. Now when I think myself to be a bit more world wise, I wish I could have been a bit more humane to that friend of mine.
Singing show tunes.
Listening to Judy Garland or Barbara Streisand.
I might have to put up a story about getting my charcoal on linen Jack Nicholson portrait from a rather light and airy lad ....
rated because with each post I like you more and more
(All from memory, the Boston Globe does a story every May 17th, which was the day it became legal...)
More gay women than men seem to get married in MA. Divorce rates run about the same as heteros, with gay men slightly higher than gay women.
None of this surprises. Our economy has not ground to a halt. The plague hasn't descended upon us to ravage our crops. No smiting has taken place.
A couple thousand couples have been able to commit to one another and to avail themselves of the several hundred statutes on the books revolving around marital status.
SCOTUS will see a case soon based on interstate commerce, contract law, and a few other things in the very near future. I will be surprised if they can find a way to uphold banning gay marriage. We've tried seperate but equal before, and have struck that down. Equal Protection under the 14th has been expanded in ways that defy credulity, so that could apply.
And on and on and on.
But more that one SCOTUS ruling has lunged me into "RCA Dog" mode. I mean, what do I know? I only had one ConLaw course at my Liberal Arts College way back in the late 1970s ....
As with so many things I was taught, I've tried my best to overcome homophobia. Still, walking down a street in Key West and having my ass ogled by a guy makes me VERY uncomfortable.
But men, my god they can be cruel to each other. I know a lot of great guys that simply will not even talk to a 'fag'. Seriously, I know I live in the south, but the straight male population is not having a bunch of queers ruin their perfectly constructed hetero world and I think it's for those reasons: fear. They're afraid that they're gonna be touched inappropriately or even worse, raped.
And if we've learned anything from Star Wars it has to be that fear leads to hate and hate leads to the dark side.
All I can figure is the homophobes are actually closeted sith, and the more secure straight men out there must be the jedi.
....Of course I don't know what this makes the rest of us.
Wookies?
Meditate on this matter, I must.
Personally, I'll take a compliment where I get it.
See this is why I need more guy friends. It's just too hard for me to see things from a guy's perspective sometimes. Thanks for the insight. I pretty much defer to your opinion because well, it's pretty much impossible to argue that a girl could know a man's mind better. Thanks for the thoughts!
I went to a sort of British HS so fag for me is more a toady than gay.
Uh, wait...
Meanwhile....every day, and in every way...I like you better and better.
I get it. I hope everyone does. Good for you, for being honest. I went through the same thing playing sports. I didn't know what the word stood for for a very long time. I didn't know it was derogatory.
How far we men have come. There are many more to yet overcome the fear of the word.
Peace from your hetero teammate.
G
I'd really prefer not to deconstruct this or any other post too much. But maybe give it another read?
This is the post I wrote. I suspect we agree entirely on the substance of the issues. I chose to make my point this way. I do not want to be subjected to earnest finger pointing about language. I mean it.
And not a single one of them is at all effeminate -- from their appearance to their jobs and hobbies and behaviors, they are not distinguishable from straight guys. The ones I know are gay told me so.
I’m not sure what the label, Man Talk, you chose for yourself means. This could all be tongue-in-cheek humor your spouting, coming from a liberal sort, or anger coming from your fears. Either way I wonder about your forum choice. I, personally, am offended as a new Salon member to find such a blog amongst all the witty, topical, intelligent articles I’ve read in the last few weeks. I find nothing redeeming in this post. I’m hurt that at the turn of 2009 this is a topic for a blog, a blog that drew responses sounding like ’good cop, bad cop’; a debate over whether it’s okay or not okay to be an affected gay man. Did I really read ’mannered, self-conscious behavior’, or ’gay guys make the best girlfriends’? Mungular, I was sorry you gave up your stance so easily to John Leonard. Your comment , to me, was the salvation in a list of comments that seemed either placating, mean, or uninformed.
Kerry Lauerman, the director of Open Salon recently suggested that “Feed Your Mind” might be a good subtitle for this forum. I find no mind feed in this entry.
Man Talk, If you can find a way to put your you-know-what into your own you-know where please insert now. What a sight that would be with your already ‘hoof -in mouth’ stance.
Sign me “Ruffled Feathers”
And I can assure you, I don't call gay people names. Read the story again, please.