mgdlin@beryl.berkeley.edu (Gary D. Lindsay) (10/10/86)
I've been off the net for several weeks, since I turned in my draft of my thesis and (groan) started working (temp - groan, groaner, groaniest). Anyway, in checking up on the net tonight, I found the bulletin board net.singles. My first impression is that it would be more accuracely styled net.horny.straight.singles. Has anyone else read this bulletin board? Do you think this be written proof that WE are not totally obsessed with S-E-X - just made out to be in a selectively blind public eye? Gary
henry@mit-trillian.MIT.EDU (Henry Mensch) (10/13/86)
Hey! Some of us have one helluva time in soc.singles! 'specially when Mikki Barry talks about the big-n-stupid types (Mikki and I share some tastes, I see ;->). We have all seen these types before--these are the guys who attach the velcro on their shoes to the lapels of their flannel shirts (they obviously couldn't read the manual!) 8-) -- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - Henry Mensch | XXXXXXXXX XXXXXX | XXX/XXXXXXX XXXXXX henry@athena.mit.edu ..!mit-eddie!mit-athena!henry
david@gladys.UUCP (David Dalton) (10/13/86)
In article <1401@jade.BERKELEY.EDU>, mgdlin@beryl.berkeley.edu (Gary D. Lindsay) writes: > > Do you think this be written proof that WE are > not totally obsessed with S-E-X - just made out to be in a selectively > blind public eye? Herein lies one of the wondrous ironies of being gay. Those who are not gay, looking in from the outside, are all too likely to see sexual preference as our distinguishing characteristic. They are also highly likely to see us as having exaggerated sexuality. Wrong. Very, very wrong. In the best of all possible worlds, perhaps sexual preference would be our distinguishing characteristic. The world we live in, though, is intolerant of diversity, nervous about sex, nervous about masculinity, nervous that Billy or Judy might be different, and nervous that certain minorities, if left unrepressed, might contaminate the majority with their peculiar ways. All these nervousnesses are deeply rooted in our institutions and have a truly frightening power to assert themselves. They assert themselves in law. They assert themselves in public policy -- who can live where and who can or cannot have a certain job. They assert themselves when someone's mother cries nonstop for two weeks because she got The News and when someone's father tells someone not to come home again. They assert themselves when children are teased, ostracized, or even beaten by their peers. They assert themselves when gay people go through years, alone, of self-hatred, self-doubt, and dread of a life that they fear lies ahead. These may be extreme examples, but all of us have gone through this to some degree. This common cultural experience is more unifying than mere shared sexual preference could ever be. As I find my youth waning and my character, I hope, maturing, I find that I have less and less appetite for confrontation -- though I am resigned to it and would storm the Bastille if need be -- and I find more and more satisfaction in opening up my life to straight friends so that they can see, if they are curious, what life is like for us. Most of them ARE curious, and it's surprising how quickly they seem to start thinking of you not as a GAY friend -- but just as a friend, because they realize that the differences are trivial. Show me a straight person who has gay friends and I'll show you someone who realizes as strongly as we do that the conflicts are bunk. Political struggle is difficult, divisive, and time-consuming. It tends to drain our energies, which I think naturally try to find a more human expression. Political struggle is essential in the circumstances in which we find ourselves. But I think we are wrong if we think that the struggle is purely a political one and that we will have won it when we've amassed sufficient power to push back the boot heel aimed at us by Georgia legislatures and old-time preachers. We are 7% to 13%. Alone, we will never have such political power. We speak of liberation, and I think by that we mean political liberation. It implies confrontation. But winning friends and supporters is also an act of liberation, and it is the opposite of confrontation. Someone wrote shortly after the Supreme Court's sodomy decision that one of the justices -- I believe it was Justice Brennan, voted against the Georgia sodomy law in Bowers vs. Hardwick, even though several years ago he had come down against gay people in another rights case. Something, the commentator wrote, had changed his mind on the question of gay rights during the past several years. A gay friend, maybe? -- David Dalton ihnp4!gladys!david -or- ethos!gladys!david ____________ P.O. Box 256, Bethania, NC 27010
konicek@uiucdcsb.cs.uiuc.edu (10/14/86)
No