Reprinted with permission from Medium.
“I don’t mind gays who don’t throw it in my face.”
Somebody who seems to think of himself as tolerant wrote that to me yesterday. I’m familiar with the sentiment, hearing it quite often. It’s what people say who AREN’T tolerant of LGBTQ people. What they really mean when they write those things is that they want us to stay in the background, keep our boyfriends, girlfriends, or other family a secret — or at least a very, very private subject, spoken of in hushed tones. And please, not when clients are around!
LGBTQ people have a right to public sexuality
Now, before you all gasp and clutch your pearls, I don’t mean the right to HAVE sex in public. I mean we should have and MUST have the same right to publicly celebrate our sexuality as straight/cis people. The reality, though, is that the public police our sexuality very differently from that of the majority. And lots of LGBTQ people get in on the policing.
Ever hear this? Gay sex is icky and disgusting. Two men having sex is so icky and gross that I can’t believe you’re even making me think about it. If only you gay people would stop being so damn open about your sexuality, we straight people would like you better.
Or how about this?
I don’t go to Pride because it’s all about sex. If it weren’t all about sex, straight people would stop dissing us. They hate us because we throw our sexuality in their faces. If only we were more respectable and ordinary, they’d chill. We have all our civil rights already. The only thing holding us back now is how freaky and nasty so many of you are.
As a vocal LGBTQ activist, I constantly hear sentiment like that.
I get it from a lot of straight people, and I get it from some LGBTQ people — mostly gay, white, relatively wealthy men. There’s a lot to unpack in that sentiment, and I write on the topic frequently. I don’t want to address everything in one column, especially since I’d just be rehashing.
Briefly though, as to the idea that our civil rights are already won, and that Pride parades are all about nasty sex, let me refer you to my young gay friend Gerald — he of the picket-fenced bungalow and middle-class white privilege.
I’ve had to point out to Gerald that Pride isn’t mostly about sex. That’s a construct of sensationalized reporting that overlooks what our parades are overwhelmingly about — while highlighting stuff that’s milder than you’ll see at many straight festivals like Mardi Gras, Carnival, Fasching, or St. Patty’s Day.
After we graduated and started active duty, the parties continued to roar. Think Tail Hook scandal. After a few years, though, my buddies chilled on the casual-sex-with-random-girls schtick …
I’ve also had to point out to Gerald that our rights are far from won. In fact, equal human and civil rights for LGBTQ people are the exception rather than the rule in most of the United States. Let’s not even talk about places like Malaysia, Eastern Europe, or the Middle East.
Setting Gerald and his issues aside for a moment, what I want to focus on today is the idea that we LGBTQ people throw sex and our sexualized lifestyles in people’s faces, that we emphasize it and and make it a big problem for ourselves.
To do that, I need to tell you a story. Pull up a chair?
When I was a young college student, I partied pretty hard. My buddies were fellow Marine and Naval officer candidates, and we were seriously wild. Kegs. Beer bongs. Lots of girls. Lots of sex.
We were ‘cooler’ than most of the rest of the engineering students because we were studying how to kill people and blow s**t up. Plus, we had a clubhouse with a fully stocked bar that non-military faculty and admin never laid eyes on.
Sometimes, it seemed like every man on campus wanted an invite to our keggers. Can you say bacchanalia, boys and girls? Animal House? Ha! The boys in that film were mere pikers.
After we graduated and started active duty, the parties continued to roar. Think Tail Hook scandal. After a few years, though, my buddies chilled on the casual-sex-with-random-girls schtick and started settling down and getting married.
I attended their weddings. I was in wedding parties. I danced with many a bride.
My friends invited me to their homes to show off their new lives. They sent me pictures of their hot wives, and sometimes I got to hold their newborn babies. Evidence of their straight sexuality surrounded me.
When I put on my uniform and went to work, even after I got a little older and the roaring party days had faded into the past, what did all the guys still talk about?
Sex. Hot women. Tits. Asses. Who’s banging whom. Constant, never-ending background buzz.
I’m in my late 50s now, and you know what? None of that ever changed. Whenever I work closely with straight men, sex is a primary topic of conversation a good deal of the time, and that conversation often focuses on tales of sexual derring-do and misadventure. (When women aren’t around, of course.)
Business and sales conventions?
Let’s not go there and say we did. The movie trope of the over-sexed (straight) business traveler is based in hard reality. So, would you say the straight people I’ve known all my life have been bent on throwing their sexually charged lifestyles in my face? Frankly, as an openly gay man, it has felt like that sometimes.
I mean, they know I’m not straight. Why should they force me to witness all that stuff? Why didn’t they just keep their lives private and not throw it in my face?
Oh, wait. I know. Because they were not offending me by living their lives and sharing parts of their lives with me. Instead, I often celebrate WITH my friends, because love and sexuality is such a wonderful part of being human. Just ask St. Valentine. Or Cupid. (Btw, he and Jupiter had a mad gay fling once, but that’s another story.)
If I had taken offense at my friends’ open sexuality, that would have been my problem.
Just like my friends cause me no problem when they kiss their wives or tell romantic stories, I should cause no problem when I walk arm-in-arm down the street with my boyfriend, or run up and kiss him passionately at a train station because I missed him.
Me living my life is not inherently offensive.
I have every bit as much right to live it in public as any straight person has to live theirs. If I have to hide my ordinary life, I’m not free and I’m not equal.
Still, many folks insist that we LGBTQ people will win respect if only we learn to be more discreet. If only we wouldn’t throw sex in their faces.
Here’s something to chew on: We’ll know we’ve achieved respect when we enjoy the undisputed, casual right to the same displays of public sexuality that everyone else in our society enjoys.