esrosedotblog

A NEW VOCABULARY

Around here, we are still adjusting to the new term for "the gays" having a wedding.

No more "gay marriage". It is "marriage equality".

A world of difference and I concur, it is just hard to get out of the habit.

This morning in the car, it struck me that when I first got into gay politics it was all about "gay liberation". First it was about our liberating ourselves and then gaining enough ground as a "people" to be liberated from society's chains.

True.

Then we gained an identity and became staunch crusaders for gay rights.

There is a critical difference between seeking liberation, someone has to free us, and gay rights, we must free ourselves and they better goddam agree with us or we will show them a thing or two.

Then, equality. Here we totally reject the second class citizenship and victimization of gay lives and take a stand as equal members of society.

These are not trivial distinctions. They reflect internal states as stark as the difference being in and coming out. The difference between the shame of being gay, the hiding in tea rooms and other out of the way places to meet and holding hands in public. And kissing. And being treated as any other people.

Busted for holding hands while gay.

Now, Newt Gingrich and others keep referring to the "gay lobby". At first I bristle at this and then, pausing to look around with pride, I have to agree with him.

The bigots have a lobby. We ought to have one too.

Yesterday we were a "special interest group" just another second class irritant.

Today we are feared. Some of the evangelicals have taken our victim robes and put them on, whining that we want to discriminate against them.

Look.

When I was in college, I was scared to death to go and live gay. I had boyfriends in a stealth kind of way but it was all in secret and heavy denial.

I got married and muffled all my feelings and thoughts for awhile until they couldn't be stifled any more.

I met gay people who were out.

I worked in Harvard Square, for chrissake. The bastion of liberal theology and practice. Men started hugging, straight and otherwise.

At first I went to gay movies. Sit and look at the screen while groping or being groped. I never went to the mens room. Too classy for that.

Then, I tried the baths. Too dark. And, somehow, always funny to me. Laughter and covert sex do not work.

I got involved in gay politics such as they were at the time. I worked on a hot line. I got on the board of a health service. I went to consciousness raising meetings.

I would like to say that I went to be of service but really I wanted to meet men.

Which I did. Some real lookers too.

I dated and slept with a few. These guys were very out. No looking back. You can't have hidden sex, be furtive, with an out gay man. It is all open, out and that does wonders for the enthusiasm and energy. Closet sex is lousy sex. Out sex, well!

Then the ads. By this time I was using a real name and all but it was a private mailbox at the weekly paper. See the Phoenix article below.

I was blessed to meet another guy, Mort who called himself Mark (yes, many did this he was an art history prof at UNH--a tipoff right there--but he didn't want anyone to know he was seeing guys and he lived with woman). I used my one in a thousand first name for real with him. A breakthrough.

The thing about Mort and I is that we relaxed. We were free to be ourselves somehow. We explored undiscovered ground together. We rented motel rooms. We walked in the park.

Then I got my own studio apartment. Dates in the afternoon. The daylight.

Listen to this. I was thrust into coming out.

The movies didn't work because on my third or fourth visit there was a raid. Actually someone had called the fire department and they evacuated the place. I resolved to never get under the thumb of "the man".

The baths didn't work because I was too amused.

The bushes were not going to work for me because I wanted to at least know a name and see a face. Maybe have coffee. A romantic.

The bars worked.

A progression.

You could sit around and get aquainted, go home with a guy or not. You could look around. And when drinking worked for me, I could lose inhibitions.

Then Mort.

Daylight.

After that, soon enough, John.

John was out out out out. There was no going backward after that.

He was a "known" gay. Out at work, in your face out. He was like me, he had been down so long that once he "got the call" he got up, stood on his own two feet and never ever looked back.

So the rest of that is history.

We became a couple, faced the reverse discrimination of other gays who scoffed at couple hood, had a lot of trials and tribulations. When you come out later you still have to go through the adolescence.

And we did.

Now FF. A life second to none. Married. Together out and proud for 38 years.

And all that time, in the middle of the "struggle" somehow. Little did we know that the first attempts to get marriage equality would lead to what we have today. A victory. Partial so far, but inevitable.

So we got conscious, got liberated, got our rights and got hitched.

An American success story.

Labels: gay history