I woke up way too early and I feel like typing so I'm just gonna ramble for a little bit...
I've met so many guys with "stigma" about being gay, it sucks but I really think things have come a long way. I've never felt bad about my sexuality, and for the most part nobody has ever made me feel bad about it.
I moved when I was a junior in high school to a tiny midwest town, and when I started that school year I'd hear guys saying things in the hall like "That's the new kid, he's gay." I would blush and almost feel ashamed about it, but I got over it quick. I wasn't a jock or anything and had next to nothing in common with most of the guys, but I made a lot of guy friends, from jocks to nerds. The cutest and most popular guys in school wanted to hang out with me all the time, and never gave me shit.
Guys would show up at my house all the time, and sit in my room on my bed with me for hours just talking, or go "road tripping" with me at night for hours. Never any inuendo, just hanging out. At house parties if I got tipsy I'd always be one of the few guys dancing, and if they didn't know I was gay by the way I danced they were crazy . But I never, ever got any shit for it. If guys were having problems with their girlfriends, they always came to me for advice or just to vent.
It was overall a really positive experience, and I'm still really happy i'm not one of those guys who says "but i fucked the quarterback" as if seducing the straight guys makes you hot shit.
At 19 when I started dating, I was always welcomed by families and friends, nobody ever had anything negative to say. Weird questions for sure, but never anything bad. During bad times i've had to live with bf's rents and was always welcomed and made to feel comfortable.
I don't know what my point is, but growing up in the midwest I would think I woulda been bashed a lot and had a really hard time, but to this day nobody has shown me more than curiousity. The worst i've heard is "It dosn't bother me just don't hit on me" which is annoying but not hateful.
To those of you so geared up over marriage and other issues, just know that we have come a long way, and things are progressing and will continue to progress. Besides, the harder the fight the sweeter the prize. Minorities and women find a lot of pride in past and current struggles for equality, I hope glbt's can feel that just as strongly. I can't relate to being held back or put down, but I'd like to think it would make me stronger, not break me.
I've met a lot of "broken" men and it makes me feel like the big difference between a lot of gay men and women in general is that women carry around their baggage until it makes them stronger, then toss it aside, and gay men have a habit of dragging it around and beating each other with it every chance they get. So how do those of us without the baggage help take a load off everyone else? Wish I knew...
Bookmarks