Redefining Homophobia

In a society where homosexuals have historically held little to no real influence, where marginalization, bigotry, and discrimination still permeate many levels of the social order, there is a temptation to grasp any vestige of power, to use what gifts we possess to assert ourselves, to feel empowered.

On Bravo's recent Great Things About Being Queer, number fourteen on the list named the ability to scare straight people as one of the great joys of our sexuality and position in society. There is a secret pleasure in knowing you can unleash the forces of your homosexuality on heterosexuals, perhaps make them feel as uncomfortable as they might have made you feel over the years, perform a little instant karmic vengeance in a petty but satisfying way.

Along this train of thought, some gay men are reveling in watching heterosexual males squirm at the prospect of two gay cowboys leaving the horses to the stables and riding each other instead. When Mickey Kaus stated he did not want to see this film because he is heterosexual, he noted:

If a gay man, say, goes to see "Wuthering Heights," there is at least one romantic lead of the sex he's interested in! In "Brokeback Mountain," neither of the two romantic leads is of a sex I'm interested in ... My wild hypothesis is that more people will go see a movie if it features an actor or actress they find attractive! If heterosexual men in heartland America don't flock to see "Brokeback Mountain" it's not because they're bigoted. It's because they're heterosexual.

Citizen Cain responded:

Got that? Kaus isn't interested in Brokeback Mountain only because he wants to see women when he goes to the movies. But it's not, NOT, because he's homophobic.

Cain goes on to poke holes in Kaus' argument with plenty of disingenuous strawmen, but that isn't what interests me here.

What is fascinating is how certain sections of the gay movement have decided the goalposts of tolerance and acceptance must be further moved to satisfy an insatiable need for validation. It is no longer acceptable that gays be tolerated and accepted in the abstract. Now heterosexual males are not allowed to be uncomfortable in graphic depictions of man on man action or else they're homophobic.

This is a dangerous and patently stupid attitude for gay men to take if they care at all for the near future of gay rights in this country.

While sexuality is malleable in the abstract, by the time many of us reach adulthood, certain sexual patterns, behaviors, and tolerances are concretely wired into our brains. No doubt a variety of influences play roles in our sexual development, from social conditioning, to genes, to hormones, to early experience, to various X factors unknown to modern researches. Sexually, we like what we like, and there is generally little accounting for it.

If the gay rights movement and the larger sexual liberation movement have brought anything to society, it is that we are each allowed to indulge our tastes as free, consenting adults. We, as gay people, want our sexuality and romantic attachments respected and tolerated in that tradition.

Tolerance, however, is not participation, and respect for sexual preference and practice is not personal approval.

I can safely say there are various elements of the BDSM culture to which I have a visceral, innate aversion. Piggy porn? Forget it. Should anyone sit me down and toss a film chock full of fisting and scat, I guarantee things will go very wrong if a bucket isn't handy, because my lunch will not remain sedentary for very long.

However, I fully support someone else's right to do these things in the privacy of their own homes. I simply don't want to hear about it, and I certainly don't want to see it, either graphically or implied. Does this make me intolerant? A piggy-phobe? Am I bigoted? Are the oppressive forces of a disdainful society at work in a brain washed to accept only the straight and narrow course?

Of course not. And yet, that is what people are implying in the wake of heterosexual male aversion to Brokeback Mountain. If heterosexual men do not want to see depictions of gay men bucking like broncos, well, something is terribly terribly wrong with them!

For beginners, theoretically accepting there's something wrong with this aversion, what exactly would the prescribed solution be? Wider exposure until their psycho-sexual preferences are softened towards greater acceptance of the concept? Ridicule? Disdain? Constant haranguing and implying they're merely latent homosexuals who don't want to admit it?

I'm sorry, but attempting to change someone's sexual preference (no matter how small an aspect) through peer and social force sounds suspiciously like reparative therapy. Reparative therapy is a bad thing, remember? Remember all those times we've argued we're gay, there's no changing it, we like what we like, so stop making us try to like sexual behavior we innately don't?

Funny how that evaporates in the face a film we want heterosexuals to like. Not only want them to like, but almost try to force them to through ridicule, derision, and accusations of homophobia. It's a strange form of politically correct sexual blackmail. Poor form. We gay folk don't like being subjected to that sort of thing. What makes us think it's ok for us to behave in the that manner towards heterosexuals?

There are plenty of arguments about why so many heterosexual men in American society have a physical aversion to seeing male on male action. There is certainly no shortage of Oprah-certified sexual psychologists in the gay community who theorize at eternal length on the cause. False sense of masculinity, latent homosexuality, artificial gender roles enforced by society, and on and on and on. Subscribe to whatever silly theory you choose. There are almost cultish devotees to every school of thought on these matter.

What isn't at argument is that there are heterosexual men who have an aversion to seeing gay sex in precisely the same vein as my personal aversion to BDSM and piggy play. As heterosexual male Ace of Spades put it in an excellent post on this issue:

Let's fess up: Straight guys are "uncomfortable with gay men expressing love." I know I am. Not in the abstract; I could give a fig if two guys are in love. More power to them. But yes, witnessing male-on-male intimacy is never really comfortable for most straight men. We're hard-wired to be averse to that.

t bothers me not one whit to know that a gay friend just hooked up. * (Except, of course, as regards the safety aspect of it.) But I'm pretty sure I wouldn't want to be there when it all goes down, either.

No matter the cause, by the time adulthood rolls around, these things are wired pretty deeply into our psyche. If we as gay men want society to accept the fact our sexual preferences and aversions will not change, we must also accept straight mens' won't either. Ridiculing them, calling them homophobes, trying to wield PC sensibilities as a weapon to change these attitudes will do nothing to alter the current state of affairs.

This is what many gay men do not understand. They believe they can will a change in sexual tastes. They believe, if they are earnest and put enough effort in it, they can get heterosexuals to not only tolerate homosexuality in the abstract, but in visual, physical form. After all, we accept heterosexual affection and sexuality in film and life, why can't heterosexuals?

Simple. Sexuality is no doubt partly social conditioning. By the time homosexuals reach adulthood, we are inured to heterosexuality through the sheer abundance of it in our lives. We see it every single day. It is not and has never been a foreign concept to us.

Heterosexuals are not similarly inured to homosexuality. Tens of millions of straight men have gone through their lives perhaps hearing whispers and comments and jokes about homosexuality, but few had actually seen it in practice.

Gay visibility is a very modern sensibility. Polling the younger generations uncovers more tolerance, acceptance, and sheer indifference to depictions of homosexuality. They are growing up in a world where same-sex affection is merely another aspect of life, out there with everything else. Someday, when the older generations are gone and the youth of today are themselves in the houses of power, homosexuality will be a non-issue in America. It is an historical inevitability.

The question we're faced with at this point in time is how we treat those who did not grow up with the benefit of socialized acceptance. Their sexual tastes will not be changed. Not by us, not by anyone.

The Sullivans and Citizen Cains of this world would use ridicule and disdain, imply there is something wrong with these men, mock them, attack them, call them bigots and homophobes and latent homosexuals.

And therein lies the peril. The more gay activists push a heterosexual's sexual preferences, the more those heterosexuals will push back. When the religious right goes apoplectic about the gay agenda and "spreading" homosexuality, this is partly what they're discussing. Sure, they're insane, but there is a small grain of truth in what they're on about that more politically moderate heterosexual men have intuited in their own observations of gay activism.

It's not enough for the Sullivans of the world that we're tolerated, we must be accepted whole hog, up to and including shuffling those poor souls to watch Heath supply the pork to Jake's beans. Or else you're broken individuals who are oppressing us all!

Stop it. Honestly. You people who throw the term homophobia around with such ease are killing the rest of us who are trying to make inroads with centrist and conservative males. You're making it harder for us to convince people that we don't want celebration and graphic approval, but simply abstract tolerance and respect that will lead to equality in society and law.

Not everyone has to enjoy Jake lunging atop the Heath-pole for us to feel validated. We will never have that kind of validation in our current society. We have several decades to go yet before we reach the point when attitudes will finally meet sexuality.

Accept people are different and have their own sexual tastes and aversions, respect it, and stop screaming homophobe if they don't want to see cock on cock swordfights.

You're making life more difficult for the rest of us than it needs to be. If straight men not wishing to see Brokeback Mountain makes you feel less accepted and less validated, then you need to see a therapist, not run out and mock heterosexuals and call them names.

The only cause being advanced by that kind of behavior is your own insecurity.

(Done with all this now. Promise.)

Comments

[Dan (AKA GayPatriotWest)]

Very well said, Robbie.

[hankhank]

It's odd though that straight women seem to have no problem watching lesbians. I think that the straight guy fear (like the army thing ("I don't want to shower with gay guys"), comes from terror of being objectified by another man, in the same way that they know they objectify women. Deep down American men don't really like women.
So I say, let em squirm:)

[Dan]

I'm picturing some poor fratboy locked up in a clockwork orange rig, forced to watch Bravo's next 'Queer Eye' marathon...

eeexcellent

[kipp]

I agree that toleration and acceptance of homosexuality is enough... validation is silly to demand and even sillier to need.

The problem I have with Kaus et al is their need to assert that they aren't just interested but, in fact, "innately averse." It's like their saying, "Every molecule of my being is straight - every fiber. I couldn't possibly be gay in any way because I am innately averse. Not just uninterested but INNATELTY AVERSE! No gay here... not a smidgen." It sounds sort of depserate.

Of course I can't blame these straight men for still playing the "not me, not me, not me" game I wasted the first 20 years of my life desperately playing. But Kaus's loudly professed aversion is just another example of it. And the other half of that same game is the joking and innuendo that subtley tell every child and teenager that gayness is a bad thing. Ridiculing Kaus et al won't change that, of course - but it doesn't hurt for kids to hear that maybe "visceral revulsion" is not okay either...

[Craig Ranapia]

I've been rather amused by the pile-on over Micky Kaus, who you might not agree with but at least deserves points for being candid.

OTOH, am I the only person who's just a wee bit tired of all the puffery about how "brave" Heath Ledger & Jake Gyllenhaal are for playing gay and incuring the wrath of Bushitler's Reich (aka "Red America" or "Jesusland"), while they're busy crapping on about how uncomfortable shooting the sex scenes made them and asserting their hetero credentials at every turn.

FFS, why don't they just tatoo "I'm straight - really" on their foreheads and be done with it? If nothing else, I'm not psychotic and realise that actors and the characters they play are two different things.

And for the benefit of Citizen Cain et. al., I'm not interested in paying $15 to watch entirely grautitous boob-and-beaver shots or get bored rigid by heterosexual actors grinding away on top of each other. If that floats you boat, go to it - it just bores and (yes) disgusts me on all kinds of levels. And, yes, I'll cop that part of it is social conditioning (pretty buttoned-down and proud of it) and that being gay I just don't find heterosexual intercourse - hardcore or simulated - or female genitalia stimulating. Get over it.

[Robbie]

I think Kipp's and Craig's comments are pretty interested when juxtaposed, if only because I wanted to point one thing out.

I have plenty of gay male friends who are very averse to female sexuality, be it lesbian or heterosexual. Not only averse, but vocally so. I'm sure we've all heard it from some of our gay friends, all the talk about fish and whatnot.

I'm not so sure that boasting of one's sexuality is a heterosexual male thing, but simply a male thing. I mean, after all, it seems half the time we gay men talk about nothing else except that we're gay.

So, again, I cut Kaus and others the same slack I'd want for myself.

[Queer Conservative]

It's hypocritical for the gay community to demand validation from everyone else, when a good portion of that community is part and parcel of a left wing ideology that is one of the most unaccepting groups in American culture.

[Craig Ranapia]

Robbie:

Fair point. I hope my comment didn't come across as the vapourings of some misogynistic queen. My point, and I didn't make it very well perhaps, is that just because I'm discomforted (for a number of reasons, one of which is my sexual orientation) by explicit hetero-sex it doesn't mean I hate straights or women anymore than Mickey Kaus hates gays because the prospect of explicit gay sex strikes him as a bit queasy making.

And, as far as I'm aware, if Kaus is homophobic he really, really sucks at it. I've never read anything under his byline that is less than 100% supportive of the civil rights and human dignity of gays and lesbians. If I'm wrong, feel free to point me in the right direction.

Anyway, BM is set for release down here in March. I'll go see it because Ang Lee has a good track record of making films for adults. And it would be nice to see if Ledger can break his recent run of bad films. Hell, I'd like to be rememberd for more than being the bloke who got dumped by King Kong's squeeze. :)

[merkley???]

i'm not gay but i live in sf so automatically so many of my peers and friends are. it's nice to see a website that is so on the level about homosexuality that doesn't treat it like some excuse to abandon logic and individuality in favor of obnoxious group think. most homosexuals i know think along these lines. it's too bad so many loudmouths have to turn the whole thing into a clown show making it difficult for your average homosexual who isn't defined by his genital meanderings but by everything else about a person's character namely -- ALMOST EVERYTHING ELSE to go about their business. basically -- yeah! right on! sweet! dude. i'll forward your link on to all my homo pals.

[John]

Robbie,
Once again, you make an excellent point and at the same time make me spit-take my beer. I haven't seen the movie yet, but when I do, I'll be thinking of "pork and beans". Thanks so much.

[Tony]

I don't disagree with anything in your post. Personally, I couldn't care less who is homophobic or who isn't. I too get tired of all the things you mention in your post that gay people whine about.
HOWEVER - Anyone who is "repulsed" by two men kissing, or two women kissing or a man and a woman kissing is an UNDERDEVELOPED neanderthal. You have no reason, in the world we live in not to have gotten over the initial shock by now. I can completely agree that you wouldn't seek out seeing it, but if you go too far out of your way not to see it... there's something there as well. And NO I don't consider "fisting" on par with "kissing". I don't buy into the "we all have our preferences" stuff. If you take that logic, then my Aunt Trudy, who is insanely afraid of raisins could be classified as normal. She just has a preference not to see raisins in any food and is completely justified in screaming hysterically at the sight of a raisin. She isn't justified... she's a little nuts. Now if she had seen a TURD in her salad, then I'd say she is justified to run screaming. But just a raisin? That's some deeper seeded shit of some sort. Running away at the sight of a raisin and/or kissing = some kind of inner lunacy/unresolved issues. Running away at sight of turd in food/someone buried to the elbow in ass = perfectly normal response.
And yeah, I know I'm being judgemental toward fisters. Oh well. No harm intended :)

[Malcontent]

Uh oh, where's Downtown Lad to leap all over a hetero's use of the word "homosexual"?

[John]

According to Tony's logic, gay men kissing is a raisin and and gay men fisting is a turd. I'd like to see his entire scale between raisin and turd for gay sex and the yuck factor associated with each.

[MS.]

I'm still wondering how they get the fist...up there...

And strangely, despite my own leanings, I found that to be a well-written post that had me nodding in agreement a couple of times.

[Queer Conservative]

I cannot watch lesbian porn. But straight porn with a hot guy? I'm there!

[Queer Conservative]

Tony, sometimes a raisin is just a raisin.

[kipp]

I am just as intrigued by a gay man being "totally grossed-out" by female sex as I am by Kaus' feelings. Boredome and or disinterest is one thing - but visceral disgust is a powerful emotion and I wonder about that power source.

I agree that boasting is a male trait regardless of orientation - but in my case, the boasting is not as interesting as the boasted-about - namely that "visceral aversion." I think another trait men share (women are not so strictly conceptualized, imo) is the need to be "authentic" in their sexuality. If the delineations of our sexual responses are driven by innate, deep-seated apetites and aversions, then our sexuality is a "true" reflection of us - not some interaction or, worse yet, some concession to the world around us. Visceral aversions suggest deep-set, static features of our soul - and that makes everybody feel more secure I suppose.

I'm just as much of a sexuality-dichotomist (at least for male sexuality) as the next guy. I'm gay - but visceral aversions to lesbian or hetero sex confuse me. Women don't interest me sexually - but why would I be "disgusted" by the vision of them being sexual? Why does Kaus say (and feel) that he is innately averse to seeing male-male intimacy? Why get so worked-up over what shouldn't interest you at all? I don't know the answer to that question - but it is worth asking ourselves rather than just cutting eachother slack.

[wilsonkolb]

We'll know that America has mellowed out about the gay issue when a movie like Brokeback Mountain doesn't launch a zillion columns like this one or the others it cites. Folks, repeat after me:

It's Only A Movie
It's Only A Movie
It's Only A Movie ...

[Geoff]

For a group marginalised for quite some time (although rapidly emerging), the fact that "It's only a movie" is something in itself. That BM generates this kind of response (as with most art) is to be expected and, in my opinion, encouraged.

[c]

But I think it's also that they are trying to, as you said: inure.

Now lets get started with some heterosexual inuring.

I know you're trying to cut heterosexual men some slack, because the poor boys have to stand yet another gay movie (first Troy, then Alexander and now this?!?!?) but really...I think they can handle it. I bet they can even handle a little teasing and ridicule because of it.

Don't worry, babe, they're tougher than they look.