THE "Q" FILES

by James Grossmann

The following articles were written by me for the Capital “Q” News, a free LGBT newspaper distributed chiefly in the Olympia area and published between 1996 and 2002 by Alan Artas. I was only one of a number of the “Q’s” volunteer writers, most of whom did fantastic work. Alan, a talented artist and graphics designer, did most of the work in getting the “Q” out, from designing the layout to the actual distribution.

I was afraid to write under my real name when I wrote these articles, so I wrote under the pseudonym, “J. Stevens,” which is based on my first and middle name.

I wrote a lot of stuff for the “Q” that wasn’t included here, but the articles here are probably better than the stuff left out. Anyway, there’s enough here for a web page. The dates on a number of articles are missing because I am missing some back issues.

SHOULD FORNICATORS HAVE SPECIAL RIGHTS?.....by J. Stevens

Moral decline has become a fact of life. In our greed for wealth, sophistication, and progress, we have abandoned the moral principles that used to make this country strong. This tragedy is especially evident in America’s deteriorating standards of sexual conduct. In our nation’s youth, we celebrated chastity as a wholesome virtue. Now, in America’s cynical middle age, we lionize sexual degenerates who promote their lifestyles as “normal.” Chief among these degenerates are the fornicators: alleged human beings who have sex when they are not married.

Though much has been said about the sins of minorities such as homosexuals, the liberal media remain silent about fornication. The horror of millions of unwed sinners spending their days rutting like animals is somehow not deemed newsworthy! Worse yet, fornicators have become the heroes of today’s mass culture. James Bond is an unrepentant fornicator, and he is not alone. Almost all of today’s cinematic heroes are fornicators who practice their sick lifestyle right before the eyes of our impressionable children.

Most shocking of all, fornicators have laid shameless claim to positions of responsibility and authority in real life. Even the president of this great country is an admitted fornicator. Oh, what a wretched disgrace to this nation, that this commander and chief of all fornicators has yet to be disgraced!

In the face of such blasphemy, all we can do is thank God for the Bible. This bedrock of America’s Judeo-Christian moral heritage states the truth about our nation’s sins. In the New Testament, Ephesians 5:3 forbids even the mention of fornication among Christians, while Ephesians 5:5 assures us that no fornicator can enter the kingdom of God. This list of relevant scriptures is endless; the message, always the same. How, then, can we build a society that exalts sexual virtue, rather than pandering to lascivious perversion? Here are some modest proposals.

1.....Allow employers to summarily fire fornicators, or people who are perceived to be fornicators. If an employee was not a virgin when he married, had sex in between marriages, or acts like a person who committed these sins, his boss should be able to fire him for those reasons. Denying this right is an infringement on the employer’s religious freedom, and grants special rights to fornicators.

2.....Forbid fornicators to marry. What sexual sin, other than adultery itself, could make a greater mockery of matrimony than fornication? And why should we allow marriage between people who engage in behavior that the Bible condemns? At the very least, Congress should ban recognition of first-time marriages between non-virgins. It’s time to start defending marriage!

3.....Forbid adoptions by fornicators. Let’s shield our children from the horrid and immoral fornication lifestyle!

I know that these measures may seem harsh to some, because fornication is a more popular sin than, say, homosexuality. But questions of biblical morality have never hinged on mere popularity. If the law should punish one kind of sex that the Bible condemns, why shouldn’t it punish the rest?

HOW I BECAME A GAY RECRUIT...... by J. Stevens

America’s right-wingers often claim that Gay America recruits young people into their ranks in order to preserve the future of our glorious homosexual agenda. The right-wingers are, of course, correct. I was a part of the Worldwide Homosexual Conspiracy’s recruiting forces for some time. Those years were rewarding, but even more rewarding was the process of being recruited as a homosexual myself. I’d like to share the experiences that led to my becoming a gay recruit, so that more readers can have a realistic understanding of how young people turn gay.

At seventeen, I was a typical lad: devoid of sexual feelings, and utterly confused about whether I liked boys or girls. Soon, I would have to choose my sexual orientation. Awed by the importance of this decision, I read up on human genitalia, and consulted my parents as well. Thank goodness for Dad’s college anatomy textbook. He and I spent hours poring over it, comparing male and female mucous membranes and urinary tracts, striving to make the right choice. Alas, our discussion reached an impasse.

“Gosh Dad,” I said, “a penis is bigger, but a clitoris seems warmer. I can’t decide which one I like!”

Dad wanted me to follow in his footsteps and be a heterosexual, but he was mostly relieved when I joined the Gay Scouts. “At least junior’s making a choice,” my old man would say. Admittedly, Gay Scouting was fun. We got to wear these hot-pink neckerchiefs and disco suits, and the scoutmaster took us dancing every week. But even after earning merit badges in hairdressing and musical theater, I still didn’t feel like a committed homosexual.

Then, in my senior year, 1976, the gay recruiting officer came to our school. What a hunk! I’ll never forget his greased body, short shorts, and that ostrich feather boa dyed in resplendent magenta! My heart raced, and my spirit soared as he described a shining future when everyone would learn to be gay, and the whole world would be united under one pink flag--made of real satin with frilly lace all around the sides. Yet even as he inspired our profoundest joy, the recruiter made us realize that only the strength of America’s youth could bring this future into being.

At the end of his speech, I leaped from my chair and said “That does it! From now on, I’m gonna be queer as a three dollar bill, and do whatever I can to help the International Homosexual Conspiracy!” My classmates applauded. My teachers beamed. The next day, I ran to the local Gay Recruiting Station and signed right up.

Looking back at my youth, I smile at my naivete. Don’t get me wrong: the Conspiracy is a good outfit. After I served two years in discotheques from Berlin to San Francisco, they paid most of my tuition for Evergreen State College. It’s just that--when you’re hiding in the bushes in your leotard and tutu--waiting to leap out and ask passers-by if they want to be gay--the days get mighty rough. Still, I wouldn’t trade away a single hour of life in the gay struggle. And I’ll always thank the Lord that the Conspiracy cared enough to make me a gay recruit.

WHY BE GENETIC WHEN YOU CAN BE GOOD??......by J. Stevens

Lately, the media has been hyping the so-called discovery of a “gay gene,” a gene responsible for homosexuality. A few scientists, and a lot of intelligent people, now believe that our sexual orientation is determined largely by our genes, just as handedness is. The gay community’s response to this idea has been divided. Some of us hail the gay gene as proof that homosexuality is as natural as heterosexuality. Others fear that knowledge of the gay gene may lead to DNA tests for homosexuality, and a number of horrible consequences like ...

parents choosing to abort gay fetuses,

insurance companies refusing to insure people who test positive for the gay gene (to avoid insuring a group at higher risk for AIDS, and

the use of gene therapies (artificially altered viruses that can safely replace genes) to “cure” homosexuality.

In a thoroughly despicable article in the Weekly Standard, some asshole named Chandler Burr argued that options like these should inspire conservatives to “embrace” the idea of a gay gene. On the opposite side of the coin, the Pro-Life Alliance of Gays and Lesbians argues that abortion should be banned to prevent the selective abortion of homosexuals and defend unborn life in general.

All this debate would be interesting if it were informed by facts and common sense, but the media don’t have much of either when it comes to genetics; our newscasts and magazines would rather trade in sensationalism. As an antidote to the usual crap from the headlines, here are some facts and common sense about genes and homosexuality.

1.....The scientific community is undecided about the extent to which genes determine sexual orientation: The current leading proponent of the theory that homosexuality has a significant genetic componant is one Dean Hamer, Ph.D., who works at the National Cancer Institute. Hamer did the relevant study in 1993. According to the NCI’s August 1993 Bulletin on the internet, Hamer reached his conclusions by studying the family histories and DNA of 114 gay men.

The study did NOT claim that a gay gene had been identified-- what it said was that 33 out of the 40 pairs of gay brothers in the study shared certain genetic markers in a certain chromosome region.

The study did NOT conclude that homosexuality is entirely or even mostly genetic. According to the NCI Bulletin just mentioned, Hamer himself believes that sexuality is too complex to be entirely explainable by our genes. In the 7-11-95 issue of the San Francisco Examiner, an article by Sally Lehrman quotes Hamer as saying “There is no gay gene, and I’ve never thought there was. Genes play a role, and there’s probably more than one of them, and other factors as well.”

Incidentally, Hamer's study only suggests genetic markers for male homosexuals. The lesbian chromosome region has yet to be found!

Hamer’s findings do NOT reflect the current consensus of the scientific community. His results and conclusions are not widely replicated, and still debated by genetics researchers. As recently as 1995, the Knight-Ridder News Service quoted Henry Greely, Chair of Stanford’s Center for Biomedical Ethics, as saying “All these findings [about genetic markers for homosexuality] have to be viewed as interesting and provocative, but not nailed down yet. Society has a tendency to think that science is farther along than it is.”

2.....The media sensationalize studies about behavior genes long before the results have been repeated and confirmed: Remember the story that males with an extra Y chromosome were more violent than the rest of us? Remember the so-called discovery of genes responsible for alcoholism? Maybe you've heard of the twin studies that showed clear links between everything from intelligence to schizophrenia. A lot of these studies received heavy exposure in every kind of media from news magazines to talk shows. But the careful reader had to look in more obscure sources--like the article "Eugenics Revisited" in the June 1993 issue of Scientific American--to find out that most of the studies in question have been retracted or refuted. An extra Y chromosome won't stop you from being a regular guy, and the causes of alcoholism., high intelligence, and many mental illnesses remain complex mysteries. Too bad findings like that aren't spectacular enough for the mainstream media.

3.....Just because we don't choose to be gay doesn't mean that being gay is genetic: Some of the most unchangeable aspects of our individual identities are shaped by how we grow up. I can't help being a native English speaker. I was raised in an English-speaking family. Even if I learned another language, English would still be my first and most natural tongue. I also can't help being an American. Even if I moved to Canada to protest our country's excess and hypocrisy, I couldn't erase my cultural heritage: it's part of who I am. Sure, genes play a role in our ability to learn our language and our culture, but it would be foolish to believe in an "English" gene or an "American" gene. Belief in a "gay gene" may turn out to be just as simplistic.

4.....The decency and dignity of being gay have nothing to do with whether we can help being homosexual: Not one shred of credible evidence supports the idea that homosexuality per se harms either gay people or society in general. Furthermore, gayness is more than just an innocuous personal quirk. Being gay is a positive good, because it creates the possibility of wholesome monogamous love between adults. Heterosexuality and bisexuality are good for the same reasons. Certain human traits are desirable, not because they make us saints, but because of the wonderful possibilities they create. We rank strength, intelligence, and creativity high among these traits; we should learn to give the same respect to our sexuality. Who the hell cares whether we can help being gay? Good is good, whether it's freely chosen, like a useful career, or natural, like our body's ability to heal.

5......Conclusion: If there were something wrong with homosexuality, it would either be an evil choice or a dread disease. Homophobes have been calling it both for many years, and will use either excuse to deny us our rights. If we spend too much time trying to establish that homosexuality is a genetic condition, we wind up arguing our case on heterosexist terms: apologizing for our sexuality by pleading that we just can't help ourselves. It's time for a new and better approach. The gay community must stop arguing about whether homosexuality is natural, and start affirming that it is good.

QUEERS ARE NOT NORMAL......by J. Stevens

Not everybody hates us. Well, okay, there are parts of this country where men don’t feel like men unless they hate fags. But even in these cultural armpits of the universe, not everyone clenches their teeth whenever they see a gay couple. Nation-wide, I doubt that queer-haters are in the majority. My guess is that most people who vote against gay rights fear rather than hate us. They’re afraid that sexual mores are changing too quickly, and afraid that pro-gay policies reflect a secular ethic that places too much emphasis on rights and not enough on responsibility. They’re also afraid of thinking too much about anything sexual, and afraid of anyone who is too abnormal.

Hatred and fear are distinct enemies that we combat with distinct tactics. Against hatred, we are confrontational, asserting that homosexuals should enjoy the same freedoms that heterosexuals do. However, against the fear of the queer communities’ abnormality, we often try to reassure the straight world that queers are perfectly normal; that queer freedom would mean nothing more unusual than Ozzie and Harry living down the street next to Ozzina and Harriet. We remind people that effeminate gay men and masculine-acting gay women are in the minority among gays, and that most of us look and act just like straight people. We don’t even talk about bisexuals or transgendered folk, let alone the existence of a queer culture. This response to fear is a mistake.

By insisting that queer people are just as normal as straight people, we are pandering to a prejudice that has damaged and divided our communities just as much as homophobia. The prejudice I’m talking about is the fear and hatred of abnormality, and it is so widely accepted that Americans typically equate normality with goodness and health. We call the study of pathological minds “abnormal psychology.” Deformed babies are said to be born with “abnormalities.” If someone is “just not normal,” that someone is to be avoided.

The destructive effects of this prejudice are widespread. We shame children who behave strangely, and so erode our society’s moral institutions by punishing behaviors that are not wrong. We ignore the voices of unconventional minorities, and so deny ourselves everything from the nudist vegetarian’s vision of health to the Bahai believer’s vision of world peace. And while we marginalize people we should consider emulating, we live in constant danger from the flip side of our prejudice; the veneration of normality. We’ll follow any idiot who seems down-home and normal enough--hence the success of Ronald Reagan. It’s normal for Americans to accept over-armament and pointless war. It’s normal for girls not to consider careers in the sciences. And it’s normal to harbor at least some antipathy toward sexual minorities.

Fear and hatred of abnormality create divisions within the queer communities. Some of us try to be normal by rejecting people who are too effeminate or leathery or eccentric. Some of us try to be normal by becoming Republicans, even though the Log Cabin program for changing the G.O.P. from within has proven a dismal failure. Some of us try to be normal by refusing to identify ourselves as gay, or attend any gay-identified events. Some of us deserve to hear a big “You?re fucking welcome” from the out and active queers whose public struggles have given us what rights we have. ALL of us should subscribe to this principle:

Normality--that is, being typical or like the majority--is a morally neutral category. So is eccentricity. Neither has anything to do with good, bad, right, or wrong.

Let’s stop wasting time trying to convince people that queer sexuality is normal, and stick with affirming our status as contributing members of society. Let’s stop trying to prove that our marriages are normal, and do our best to make our them loving. Let’s stop trying to shoo the eccentric wing of gay culture back into the closet, and stand with all members of all our communities when we demand to be treated fairly. Let’s quit pretending that Normality is right, and stay focused on the principle that homophobia is wrong. Being queer is not normal; it doesn’t have to be either.

WE ARE NOT A NATION......by J. Stevens

For those who came in late, “nation” and “country” don’t mean the same thing, no matter what your second grade teacher told you. A country is an area inhabited by one or more nations ruled by a government. A nation is a people united by a common history, a common culture, and usually a common language. The United States is one country, but comprises a number of nations. Each Native American tribe is a nation. The African Americans are a nation. The sexual minorities are not.

We sexual minorities are not united by a common history or language. While the Stonewall riots were an important catalyst for the promotion of GLBT rights, they did nothing to change the fact that GLBT people are born into every race, class, creed, and nation the world over. This diffusion of sexual minorities was not the result of an ancient Diaspora, and Stonewall did not result in the creation of a Queer Zion, whose members speak a restored version of the Lost Language of Lavender.

Furthermore, we sexual minorities are not united by a single culture. Urban queer culture exists, but it is too fragmented according to gender, ethnic heritage, and sexual sub-types to claim unity. Even if this urban culture were united, it would still fail to represent the vast numbers of GBLT people who do not identify with it. Not every one of us smiles when Judy sings “Somewhere Over the Rainbow.”

The fact that we sexual minorities are not a nation should be obvious, yet astonishing numbers of people seem to overlook it. As a minority, we queers are peculiar in that we are stereotyped by the very media that seek to promote our interests. If we came to know the GLBT communities exclusively through movies and glossy pro-gay magazines, we would come away convinced that most of us are affluent young white liberal gay men. Even in San Francisco, one can find at least one mural that honors this stereotype; the man depicted comes complete with mustache and shorts.

The racial and sexual divisions among the GLBT communities explain the frequent exclusion of racial minorities and women from the media’s depictions of sexual minorities, but it doesn’t explain the exclusion of many not-so-affluent old white Republican gay, bisexual, and transgendered men. More than racism and sexism are at work here: some of our political advocates want to pretend that the GLBT communities are a nation.

This desire is understandable. After all, since McCarthyism destroyed the radical left in this country, no one has seriously entertained a movement dedicated to establishing equal rights for absolutely everybody. The biggest civil rights success after the fifties was organized by and for the members of one nation, the African Americans. Since this success, all of America’s oppressed peoples have wanted to be nations.

Though women are not a nation, some women have tried to counteract male oppression by advocating separatism and recognition of separate female ways of understanding the world, as if feminine humanity constituted a distinct exotic culture. Though GLBT people are not a nation, expectations of political conformity are high among the advocates of equal rights for sexual minorities, and media depictions of GLBT people -- make that one Ellen and a number of handsome gay men -- exhibit weird uniformity. Old fat Baptist queers? You won’t even see them in Evergreen student art films, let alone glossy gay magazines.

As you, the reader, may have guessed, I believe that our queer illusion of nationhood will ultimately do more harm than good to the cause of equal rights for sexual minorities. There are a lot of GLBT individuals who are neither young nor affluent; who do not think of themselves as part of the urban queer culture; and whose religious and political beliefs are far from liberal. GLBT political leadership undermines its own support base by ignoring and alienating such people.

Here in America, we seem to have forgotten how to put our differences aside for the sake of common goals. In the struggle for equal rights for sexual minorities, there are times when mainstreamers and flaming androgynes; conservatives and liberals; assimilationists and queer-culture-mongers; youngsters and seniors; and queer folk from many mutually alienated groups must all stand together. If the recent words of people like Trent Lott and James Dobson are any indication, now is one of those times.

At this point, we should recall one of the symbols of the GLBT rights movement, the Rainbow Flag. It was meant to celebrate our diversity, and should never be used as a rug that non-conformist queers have to be swept under in the name of an illusory nationhood.

Alienated members of our communities need to know the following: You don’t have believe that Stonewall was the decisive moment in world history; you don’t have to equate coming out with coming into being; you don’t have to toe the party line on affirmative action and abortion; you don’t have to be anti-religious; you don’t have to spend your days obsessing about politics; and you don’t even have to look or sound queer to help promote your civil rights. All you have to do is be willing to work with people who represent many beliefs, many backgrounds, and more than one nation.

WHY NOT CALL THEM FRIENDS?......by J. Stevens

Maybe they like us because we can talk shopping with them. Maybe they like us because their ex-lovers hated us. Maybe they like us because it’s more fun to talk to men without the sexual tension and the games. Whatever the reason, some heterosexual women enjoy close friendships with gay men.

What do we gay men call such women? They deserve a nice name. Do we count them among the divas, our female cultural icons? Are noble titles like “queen” and “princess” reserved for them? No, we stick our female friends with a label that sounds like a callow frat-house slur aimed at queers and straight women alike.

Is anyone out there as sick of the term “fag hag” as I am? What a puke of a name to give some of our best friends. What’s our excuse for using it? We might think that it’s hip to be polically incorrect. After all, we don’t want our liberalism to sound too sentimental or preachy. We need to dish out the ugly language to show that we just as tough-minded as the straight boys are.

Okay, maybe our motives are less superficial. ?Fag hag? might not really be a put down. Some insults are terms of endearment in disguise. One of my friends in high school used to greet me with ?Hey, ugly.” I think my return greeting was ?Yeah, stupid, what do you want?? It didn’t hurt because we knew each other well enough to know when we were kidding. Maybe names like ?fag hag? are the same kind of joke.

The joke’s gotten old. It’s time to quit talking about ?fag hags,” and let some fresh air into our smelly old box of labels.

What should we call straight female friends that we’re madly in like with? “Homophile” sounds too morbid and clinical. “Ally” sounds too damn political. “Angel” sounds too intimate for people who are just friends. And “friend who happens to be straight and female” is too long and awkward.

Here’s a suggestion: When straight women come into our lives and offer us company and moral support and a good neighbor’s readiness to help, why not call them friends? We don’t need to label our friends differently according to their genders and sexual orientations.

If you’re a gay man, make this year a better one; chuck the old “fag hag” label, and let all your friends know that you accept them as they are.

HOUSE TO VOTE ON URBAN FAUNA RELATIONS ACT...... by J. Stevens

Calling homosexual behavior among dogs and other animals a public scandal, representatives from several socially conservative districts have drafted legislation that will bar public same-gender sex acts among pets and “other urban fauna.”

Despite ongoing issues surrounding the alleged necessity of the newly christened Urban Fauna Relations Act, sponsors are optimistic about its passage given the electorate’s current concerns about family values.

One source within the House, who spoke on the condition of anonymity, is quoted as saying “It’s bad enough that we have gay people holding hands in restaurants where children can see them. What can we expect children to think if they see boy dogs doing it with boy dogs or girl dogs doing it with girl dogs?”

The same source also pointed out that public same-gender sex among animals is not confined to pets. Confirmed sightings of seagulls engaged in homosexual coupling have prompted hearings in support of the new legislation. During these hearings, several religious right-wing representatives reportedly fainted upon learning that some species, such as snails and earthworms, are hermaphroditic.

Enforcement of the Urban Fauna Relations Act remains a sensitive issue. Early versions of the bill called for a ten-fold increase in funding for municipal animal control departments to pay for additional manpower along with course work in identifying animal gender and manually uncoupling animals caught in the act.

“We’re not interested in uncoupling heterosexual animals,” said one representative, “that’s the Humane Society’s turf. We just want to target the unnatural stuff.”

GAY HORMONE FOUND......by J. Stevens

A recent study at the Institute for Physiological Studies in Switzerland suggests that sexual orientation is controlled by a newly discovered hormone. Dubbed “dorothenin” by its discoverer, Swiss physiologist and geneticist Otto Hosenschlang, the hormone has been shown to play a crucial role in the determination of sexual orientation in rhesus monkeys.

Asked if dorothenin was the long sought “gay hormone,” Hosenschlang replied, “It’s simplistic to think in terms of a single determinant to sexual orientation. The genetic, physiological, and environmental antecedents to behavioral predispositions tend to be complex and interdependent.”

Nonetheless, Hosenschlang admitted that a seven-week daily regimen of dorothenin injections significantly increased homosexual behavior in all but two of the sixty-nine rhesus monkeys used in his ground-breaking study.

Though full-scale trials with human subjects have yet to be completed, preliminary reports have confirmed elevated levels of dorothenin in GLBT subjects. Hosenschlang has also stated that dorothenin treatments “worked on a neighbor kid” who has changed his college major to interior design and moved in with his soccer coach, Jurgen.

Despite protests from conservative religious groups, the FDA and its sister organizations in Europe are studying the application of dorothenin treatments to population control. FDA spokespersons have confirmed that, notwithstanding the popularity of artificial insemination in some quarters of the GLBT community, widespread use of dorothenin would have “an ameliorative effect on the current rate of population growth.”

ARE YOU A DRUGGIE?......by J. Stevens

Are you taking too many mind-altering drugs? In this day and age, it’s hard to underestimate the importance of this question. After all, drug abuse is America’s great Satan, and conscientious citizens like you want to live protected from this menace. We all want to be true adults, ready to face life’s hardships without the need for chemical crutches. Besides, drugs feel great, and you wouldn’t want to have a problem that would force you to stop using them. So how about it? Are you a druggie?

To help you answer this question, the humble author of this article has come up with two tests. The first consists of two questions, scientifically designed to determine whether you, the reader, have problems with drugs.

QUESTION A: Do you do drugs?

QUESTION B: Does this cause problems?

If you answered “yes” to both questions, you have problems with drugs. But in case two questions aren’t enough, here’s another test. Mark each of the following statements true or false.

1.....Coughing up brown phlegm that looks like froggy road-kill every morning is a normal sign of aging that begins at about twenty.

2.....Guys get morning sickness too; it’s a psychological response to the joy of bar hopping the previous night.

3.....Generic beer and fortified wines are quality products that allow the budget-conscious consumer to enjoy the sophisticated taste of a good drink.

4.....Peanut butter and potato soup are more nutritious than the decadent foods I would buy if I did not wisely spend my money on drugs.

5.....Bodily waste that feels like battery acid when it sprays out is another normal sign of aging that begins at around twenty.

6.....The nice thing about pot is that, on the next day, it doesn’t--what doesn’t it do? I keep forgetting.

7.....Eating, sleeping, and having orgasms are annoying distractions, and I’m so glad I don’t do those things anymore.

8.....They have to make cocaine legal and they have to do it NOW. Please, God, make them legalize it NOW! I’ll perform oral sex on every legislator if they’ll just let me buy it at Safeway NOW!

9.....The reason my hand won’t stop shaking is that I haven’t hit it enough with my dictionary.

10.....I can’t tell if the internal organs seeping from my nostrils are hallucinations. I must watch “Barney” so that he will answer this question.

If you answered “true” to any of the above statements, drag your sorry carcass into rehab. If you need a chemical to put your brain on hold--just so you can be silly, just so you can relax, just so you can dream, and just so you can think about something else--you’re a druggie. And you’ll have to do something about it, before the toxic waste in your body does something about you.

AGAINST OUTING.....(July 1997).....by J. Stevens

If America’s sexual minorities want freedom, they have to fight for at least two rights: the right to be open about their personal lives, and the right to keep their personal lives private. These are not contradictory aims; ideally, each of us should have the option to choose whether anything legal that we do in private will be hidden or revealed. Heterosexuals take it for granted that they can publicize their weddings without being harassed by neighbors or persecuted by lawmakers. Heterosexuals also take it for granted that they can hide anything legal that they do behind closed doors. Married couples don’t have to tell people what turns them on. Straight soldiers don’t have to tell their superiors who they’re attracted to. When it comes to sexual activity that occurs within the limits of the law, heterosexuals have the right to tell all on the afternoon talk shows, and an equal right to say “It’s none of your business.” Except in certain situations where the law requires openness about marital status or domestic partnership, American straights can be as out or as closeted as they want to be about their private lives.

Too often, this is not true for sexual minorities. For instance, it’s well known that gays get persecuted for revealing their sexual orientation. High school students who reveal their homosexuality are often viciously harassed; workers who reveal their homosexuality risk getting fired; soldiers who reveal their homosexuality get discharged. All this has made headlines for years. What receives less attention in the media is homophobic indifference to the gay person’s right to privacy.

Even gay soldiers who DON’T announce their sexual orientations can be discharged on all kinds of flimsy pretexts if they are found out. Straight sailors can see as many hookers as they like without fear of coming under scrutiny, but the gay soldier is not given the right to say “My love life is none of your business.”

In states without the relevant anti-discrimination laws, everyone from cabinet makers to school teachers can be fired from their jobs if their bosses find out that they are gay from subtle clues or third party gossip. Straight workers can have fifty-two affairs a year, for all their bosses care, but gay workers in most states are not given the right to tell their employers “My love life is none of your business.”

In too many states, laws make ‘sodomy’ (read homosexual acts) a crime. Under such laws, heterosexual husbands could withhold sex unless their wives got satanic tattoos on their bellies--and no judge would ever take notice! But sodomy laws forbid the gay citizen to tell the state “My love life is none of your business.”

Gay people deserve a right to privacy. So do bisexuals and transgendered people. That’s why outing is wrong. If governments and companies should refrain from looking through keyholes into the private lives of sexual minorities, then so should the rest of us. You can’t fight for the rights of your brothers and sisters if you don’t respect those rights yourself. Suppose you don’t like gays and bisexuals who pass as heterosexuals by marrying. There’s nothing wrong with saying so. And there’s certainly nothing wrong with trying to persuade these people to come out. But the radical fringe who would out such people without their consent are no different ethically than the homophobic witch finders in the military.

Arguably, there may be extreme circumstances in which outing might be justified. If the legislature were on the brink of passing some draconian anti-gay measure, and the bill's author were secretly having affairs with his male pages, outing that author might constitute the best defense for the glbt community. But, all things being equal, the vast majority of us should have the right to be left alone: the right not to tell, even if we’re asked.

GREENERS TAKE NOTICE: (April, 1997): With Republican legislatures across the country eager to pass anti-gay legislation, I can’t help but wonder: wouldn’t America be better off if the Right Wing were more like the Left?

1.....Suppose, for instance, that most right-wing Protestant sects were too addicted to identity politics to form a coalition. In that case, Assemblies of God women, assemblies of God men, Baptist women, Baptist men, non-denominational Christian women, non-denominational Christian men, know-nothing fundamentalists, educated fundamentalists, and the snake-handling crazies for Christ would all have to form separate movements. After all, each of these groups has its own identity, history, and needs, so how could they ever come together? Thus divided, the religious Right Wing would be considerably less powerful; the factions just mentioned would amount to a handful of fringe constituencies, no stronger than America’s Neo-Nazis.

Heaven knows, the Left is sold on identity politics. To hear some lefties talk, the gay liberation movement should be abandoned in favor of many smaller movements for gay men, gay women, bisexual men, bisexual women, and transgendered people: with separate movements in each of these categories for people of color and (to use consistent language) “people of bleachedness.”

Don’t misunderstand me; the social and political differences between these groups are not trivial. Many years of hard work and consciousness raising will have to occur before the cultures just mentioned can unite in friendship and harmony. But we must remember that that doctrinal and historical differences that separate the rabid right-wing churches are not trivial either. Yet we have the Christian Coalition, because the Rabid Right knows that complete harmony among its factions is not required for political action. Alliance among parties, even when the parties are mutually alienated over many issues, has made the Right Wing strong. Alliance could make the Left Wing strong as well.

2.....Now let’s suppose that the Right Wing had no clear language in which to express its political aims. Let’s suppose that increasing numbers of right wing intellectuals wrote all their anti-gay diatribes in postmodernist gobbledygook that no one, including the intellectuals themselves, could understand. In that case, messages like “God hates homosexual acts, and homosexuals will never enter his Kingdom,” would come out like this:

“In the contextual constructs constituting the realization of the deification paradigm of the traditional cosmos, the deconstruction of the social production of sexual subjectivities relevant to the gender distribution in modalities related to the biopolitics of domestic space represents an asocial and political epistemological breakdown which precludes the introduction of oppositional gender-structures into the socio-ecological topology of our bourgeois meta-discourse.”

If the right wing intelligentsia could write no better than this, their publications would have no power to persuade anyone to work against the LGBT community.

America’s Left should be deeply ashamed that so many of its academics have cocooned themselves in impenetrable (and yes, meaningless) jargon, rather than getting progressive messages out to the people.

3.....Since the 1960’s, the American Left has made many mistakes. It allowed popular media to distort its messages, until the public came to equate the Left with the glorification of drugs, with shallow neo-Marxism, and with the cult of youth. There was a time when the Left fought for the whole working class: all ages, all colors. That time must come again for all ages, all colors, all creeds, genders, and sexual orientations if the term “liberation” is to have any meaning for future generations.

FOR MONOGAMY.....(May, 1997).....by J. Stevens

Monogamy is the wisest and most moral arrangement for human sexual relationships. Yes, this is an opinion, offered without apology in the name of the quaint, old-fashioned belief that some opinions--and living arrangements--are better than others.

My support for monogamy is not based on any religious consideration. I’m an atheist, after all. But you don’t have to believe in Adam, Eve, or Steve to believe that having only one partner is the best way to go. There are other reasons why grown-ups should get married--even if the law permits marriage only in a spiritual sense for some of us.

1.....Promiscuity is a goddamn health hazard. Those among us who believe that this is too trivial a reason to have as few partners as possible need to visit the AIDS quilt sometime soon.

2.....Steady partnerships are better than constant personnel changes in virtually every type of non-competitive human activity. We take it for granted that all kinds of small groups--from jazz musicians to comedy duos to brain surgery teams--do their best work when their members know each other very well. Why would sexual partners be any different in this regard?

3.....It’s more fun to do anything with someone you adore and admire than it is to do the same thing with someone you hardly know. It’s more fun to shop for groceries with someone you adore and admire. It’s more fun to do yard work with someone you adore and admire. It’s more fun to get snowed in with someone you adore and admire. Gee, does love make sex more fun too? Fuck, yes!

4.....In theory, of course, a faithful polygamous marriage would also have the advantages just mentioned. However, in practice, polygamous arrangements in diverse countries and cultures have tended to be non-egalitarian and sexist, with one male designating a pecking order among the first, second, and additional wives. Sorry, not my value system.

5.....Monogamous partners get more sex. Deal with it.

6.....Much has been said about the quest for variety, and how wonderful it is to acquaint oneself with the full range of human sexual expression by having many partners. Much of what’s been said is nonsense. If you don’t know your partner, all you know is a body, and the human body doesn’t come in that many varieties. How exciting can even the most beautiful bodies be after a hundred one night stands? Gay men, for example, might ask themselves how many permutations of long, short, stubby, skinny, twisty, straight, cut, and uncut can remain fascinating after a hundred one-night stands. Love has more to offer, in just about any body.

7.....Sex leads to longing for intimacy just as surely as intimacy leads to longing for sex. If some attractive person turns you on, and you manage to go to bed with this person--again and again--pretty soon, you’ll wind up wanting to spend more and more time with your partner even out of bed. Before you know it, the two of you will be doing everything from seeing movies to cooking to growing old together.

Does this scenario sound too idealistic? Then remember that half the marriages and most of the re-marriages among heterosexuals succeed; despite the fact that divorce has become much easier; despite the fact that, for most of history, marriage was an instrument of the male oppression and enslavement of women; and despite the fact that the need for two-income households and the economic burden that children have come to represent both discourage family life.

If monogamy between liberated equals did not conform--in some powerful way--to a widespread longing for exclusivity and intimacy between sexual partners, the abolition of marriage would be a fact of history already. Instead, we live in a world where even gay people--traditional strangers to the altar--are fighting for the right to marry legally.

Yes, there are a number of practical reasons to preach monogamy, but even so, we should be thankful that marriage is no longer as mandatory as it once was, and also thankful that divorce is easier. There are still a lot of abusive husbands and boyfriends out there, and the sooner they’re kicked out of their marriages and into jail cells, the better.

As important is the need to end abuse is, there are also more positive reasons why the regulation of marriage should be as liberal as possible. Monogamy is beautiful, and should be exalted as an ideal, not imposed like a prison sentence. Ideals can be hard to live up to. In a world where many people have to graduate from college before they can set up a household, many people will lose their virginity before they marry at twenty five. And sometimes, when life gets to be too much, some of us will reach out for someone to be close to, even if it’s just for a little while--even if it’s just for one night. In such a world, sensible people can only strive to find a lifelong partner, but failing that, have as few partners as possible, and be faithful to each and every one.

WHY BE PROUD?.....(June, 1997).....by J. Stevens

Should being gay should make us proud? Gayness is not an achievement; none of us had to study for four years at The Evergreen State College to be ordained as practicing homosexuals. Gayness is not a talent; our attraction to members of the same sex does nothing to make us stronger, smarter, or wiser than anyone else. Gayness is not a distinct heritage; although there are gay cultures, our communities represent a sampling of all humanity the world over. Only some of us can be Hmong, Nigerian, American, Bantu, Japanese, or French, but anybody could be a homosexual. What distinction makes gayness something to be proud of?

Some people try to answer this question by pointing out all the great figures of civilization who happened to be gay. Da Vinci, Michelangelo, Walt Whitman, Tchaikovsky, Catherine the Great, Gertrude Stein, Eleanor Roosevelt, Willa Cather, and dozens of other historical and artistic luminaries were gay; shouldn’t that make us proud? I don’t see why. The accomplishments of these famous people had nothing to do with their sexual orientation. Da Vinci would have been just as great a genius if he had been straight. Eleanor Roosevelt would have been just as influential if she had found men more attractive than women. Furthermore, if the great gays of history should make us proud, does that mean that the bad gays of history should make us ashamed? Should we agonize about Roman caesars and other imperialist swine who may have been gay? Should we tell the world we’re sorry for the misdeeds of people like J. Edgar Hoover and Roy Cohn?

Some people think these questions don’t matter; that we should be proud to be gay just for the hell of it. Pride-for-the-hell-of-it is a modern American fad that started as a tepid middle-class response to the civil rights struggles and collective shame about the Viet Nam War. Nowadays, we can be proud to Americans--no matter how materialistic and shallow our values are, no matter many American chemical factories blow up in India, and no matter what Oliver North did with our defense dollars in his spare time. In fact, we Americans can be proud of damn near anything. We can be proud to be redheads, southpaws, Mustang owners, or members of any group, no matter how irrelevant the group’s defining characteristics might be to our merit as human beings. Pride-for-the-hell-of-it is not for me; Gays ought to have reasons to be proud.

We do. Better reasons than famous gays or attitude fads. The gay community is something to be proud of because we bring love into a world that tells us that we can’t. When the world treats us with hostility founded on superstition, our lives prove the superstitions false. When religious fanatics dismiss our mutual bonds as gutter obsessions, we still love, and prove the bastards wrong. When demagogues in Congress and the state legislatures revile us as indecent creatures, unfit to marry or raise children, we live as decently as any straight community on Earth, and prove that there is more to our integrity than middle-class conformity or fear.

We should be proud of our heroes: from Susan Anthony to Harry Hay to Col. Margarethe Cammermeyer and many more; gay men and women who have spoken out in the name of equality, and fought ignorance with the truths represented in their lives. We should be proud of all gay man and woman who live up to high ethical standards in spite of constant bombardment from childhood with homophobic lies about our supposed immorality. We should be proud of those in-your-face overt-as-hell queers who have the guts to face a bigoted nation head on without a hiding place. We should be proud of gay everymen and everywomen who let go of their self-hatred and learn to love. We should be proud of our gay youth who remember the young suicides that the world would rather forget--and who resolve to go on living. We have many reasons to be proud, and we have to hold fast to each one. Like it or not, we are all involved in a struggle to protect love from hate. We won’t win by being ashamed of who we are.

STRAIGHT JACKET.....(July 1997).....by J. Stevens

What if you were straight? What if the only kind of people you wanted to fall in love with were members of the opposite sex? That would mean you could live free from anti-gay oppression, right? Don’t be too sure. Imagine yourself straight for a little while, and think about the following:

You are ten, and come from a family in which it’s customary to greet, part, and congratulate with a kiss on the cheek; parent to child, sister to sister, brother to brother. There is nothing erotic or unwholesome about these exchanges, but when your friends see you kiss a same-sex sibling just back from a long trip, you become the target of insults from your peers, who think you’re gay.

You are sixteen, and male, and you and your buddies notice a same-age girl. Your buddies start talking it up about how sexy she is. You don’t think so. The girl your friends see doesn’t attract you, isn’t your type. But you join in and say she is. If you’re not dishonest, your friends will think you’re queer.

You are twenty, and have a marginal income. Your best friend from high school works as a cashier, and is also as poor as a church mouse. The two of you have to live somewhere, so you decide to share the cost of rent. Six months later, the landlord wants to jack the rent up, and can do so most easily by getting rid of you. You and your friend must leave the apartment; the law says the landlord can evict people for even looking gay.

You are thirty, and absolutely straight. But you have no lover; you’re a failure at romance. Maybe no one told you enough about hygiene. Maybe you don’t realize that you stay home too much. Maybe you’ve spent too many hours sitting in bars waiting for your perfect mate to pick you up. At least you have your job; your evaluations have all been good. But your boss fires you, because a thirty year-old who doesn’t have a lover must be gay. The laws in your state don’t prohibit discrimination against sexual minorities.

You are forty-five. You and your friends are all members of a church whose pastor rails against the homosexual agenda. You think the pastor’s wrong. You don’t hate gays; you don’t care about them, really. That one gay guy you knew in college wasn’t an evil person. But now your church friends want your opinion on an anti-gay initiative. You’re not for the initiative, but you say that you are. If you’re not dishonest, your friends will think you’re queer.

You are sixty, and have three wonderful sons. You have never hugged them, because you were afraid that would have turned them into homosexuals. You have never consoled or confided in them, because you afraid that would make them less than manly. You have kept them at arm’s length all your life, because being too close to your sons would make them mama’s boys or pansies. Now, you spend your days wondering whether your sons will call you, when they will ever visit you, and why your own flesh and blood have become strangers.

Not all straight people feel this oppressed by homophobia, but a lot of them do. We gays, lesbians, bisexuals, and transgenders share the closet with armies of heterosexual men and women who live straight jacketed in fear. When will America learn that freedom for minorities means freedom for all?

YOU DON'T HAVE TO BE GAY TO BE A HOMOPHOBE.....(August 1997).....by J. Stevens

Why do so many straight people hate queers? One popular explanation is that most straights are really closet queers who try to distance themselves from that reality by being as anti-queer as possible. Certainly, this is true in some cases. One famous example was Roy Cohn, Senator Joe McCarthy's anti-commie anti-queer lawyer who turned out to be gay. But is Cohn's brand of homophobia really typical?

If Colorado’s Amendment Two is any indication, heterosexism is the majority’s prejudice in many parts of this country. Are the majority of Coloradans really queer? What about the Bible Belt? Are most of the children there the result of guilty spouses trying to impress each other with false displays of heterosexuality? Before we accept such a bizarre account of America’s heterosexism, we should remember some other factors that help create and maintain homophobia.

Sadly, many churches and clergy whip up interest in religion by whipping up fear of queers. A lot of people eat it up, of course. Hatred can be fun. You can vent all kinds of frustrations by screaming your head off and carrying around a sign that says "God Hates Fags." If you can hate queers in the name of The Lord, you can vomit out your vilest contempt at innocent strangers without feeling even a moment of shame. This explains a lot of behavior in the Bible Belt, but how is it that so many people with no religion hate every member of our community?

Sexism may be one of the chief reasons. Homophobia is--in all likelihood--one of the consequences of male domination and devaluation of women. The reason for this has to do with every sexist straight man's dilemma: How is it that women can be objects of contempt and people you want to love at the same time? There are two ways to resolve this dilemma. One is to give up sexism. We men don't give up sexism often or readily, since doing so would entail making room for more women in the board room and having more men take up full time housekeeping and child-rearing. This leaves the other solution to the dilemma: you can be contemptuous of the people you want to love if you devalue love--if you take the idea of love as partnership and support for a special someone, and pervert it so that you equate "love," and even physical and personal attraction for someone, with possession and domination.

All this explains how straight sexist males can feel "predatory" when they look at women, and have a "conquest" when they make love to a woman. Consequently, straight sexist men feel "preyed upon" when other men look at them with desire; and they feel threatened with "conquest" by any man who might even fantasize about making love to them.

The horror that so many straight men feel about homosexuality is horror at the prospect of having other men treat them in the way they've been taught to treat women. Homophobia did not arise in a vacuum. Sexism is one of its chief causes. That makes it especially disheartening to hear some gay men express contempt for women that Feminine Humanity has done nothing to earn. Wake up, guys, and outgrow your misogyny. The rights you uphold may be your own.

INNATENESS BE DAMNED.....(October, 1997).....by J. Stevens

When are we going to stop defending homosexual feelings by saying that it they are not freely chosen? Claiming that gayness is good because it is genetic is a truly stupid way to defend gay rights. We should all stop using that absolutely chowder-headed argument today. Before you, the reader, take offense at these statements, let me make a few points that ought to be obvious.

1.....No one freely chooses their sexual orientation. The idea that only heterosexuality can come naturally to people is an ultra-right-wing Big Lie.

2.....For many reasons, the chief one being our media, the public has come to equate genetic or innate tendencies with those over which we have no control, and learned or environmental tendencies with those we can change at will. These equations are false.

2a.....While we can’t help having our genetic tendencies, we can often control their expression in our lives through knowledge and free choice. Consider these things: Height and diabetes are genetic, and nearsightedness can be. But short people don’t stare at the peanut butter on the top shelf and say “I’ll never reach it, because my height is genetically determined.” Instead, they get a footstool and get the peanut butter. Diabetics don’t lie down and die because their genes tell them to; they use diet or insulin to go on living. People with inherited nearsightedness don’t allow their genes to condemn them to a life of bumping into things; they consult optometrists, and get glasses.

Similar considerations apply to psychological tendencies that might have a strong genetic component. Inherited shyness should not condemn people to live in isolation; shy people can be taught to overcome their fears and socialize successfully. An inherited bad temper should never excuse violent behavior; nothing genetic prevents any sane person from counting to ten before speaking, or leaving the room to cool off. Our inherited sexual drives are by no means uncontrollable; we are all free to walk away from potential lovers if that’s what it takes to remain faithful to our monogamous partners.

2b.....While the many things we learn from our environment can expand the number of free choices we can make, they can also shape our identities and behavior in ways that we are helpless to control. How many of you who are reading this can help being native English speakers? Ever try to stop being an American and will yourself to become psychologically and culturally indistinguishable from a native Chinese Politburo member? How many of you can wish away the compulsion to keep your clothes on in public? Once educated, can you go back to not knowing what you know now? Once grown up, can your spirit fully return to its childhood state through anything short of a bizarre brain injury? Of course, we answer “no” to all these questions, because this much is apparent to thinking people: What we learn can free us to do certain things, but can also force us to think and behave in certain ways just as easily as any gene can.

3.....Some free choices are helpful, some are destructive, and some are socially irrelevant. We can choose to help old ladies across the street. We can choose to murder our parents for their money. We can choose to chew gum. The fact that we freely choose a behavior does not, by itself, make it good, bad, or indifferent.

4.....Some tendencies that are difficult or impossible to control by unaided willpower are helpful, some are destructive, and some are socially irrelevant. Sweet-tempered empathy comes naturally to some people. So does homicidal insanity. So does a tendency to unconsciously look upward when bored. The fact that certain tendencies come naturally to some people does not, by itself, make such tendencies good, bad, or indifferent.

With all this in mind, we can stop trying to use genetics to defend gay rights. The fact that we can’t help being gay doesn’t make gayness genetic; lots of feelings we can’t help are learned. Even if gay feelings were genetic, that doesn’t mean that we could not control or eliminate gay behavior. If the tendency towards pedophilia were inherited, we would be justified in expecting pedophiles to prevent all expression of this tendency by any means necessary including long-term confinement. So why shouldn’t the government tell homosexuals to either change their evil ways or control their horrible genetic disease?

The answer is simple: homosexuality per se is not destructive. It harms neither the homosexual nor society at large. In a free society, the absence of any harmful effect is a complete and absolute justification for anything that anyone does on their own time. What is more, homosexuality, as a vehicle of monogamous love between consenting adults, is extremely helpful: it is GOOD.

The harmlessness and possible benefits of homosexual behavior to society are the only defenses for gay rights that anyone needs. When it comes to any discussion of whether being gay is okay, the whole nature vs. nurture issue is a mound of rhetorical dogshit that the community needs to hose off its shoes as soon as possible. Let’s quit talking about whether gayness is innate. Let’s quit caring about whether we can help being queer. Let’s just enjoy our lives, and defy the straight world to see any evil in them.

YOU ARE NOT DISGUSTING.....(November 1997).....by J. Stevens

One night, my lover and I watched an anti-gay pseudo-documentary video--partly for morbid laughs, and partly because we thought it was important to stay informed about the current state of right-wing homophobic slander. Of course, the tape featured a number of whoppers about the gay lifestyle. I didn't know whether to laugh or throw bricks at the TV when the video's narrator--sounding like the voice of patriarchal omniscience that narrates most junior high school science films--announced that the typical homosexual has over 500 partners. Hey, where were my 500 partners? I knew about my current lover, but remembered nothing about the 499 sweaty one-night stands I'd had before. What kind of monstrous amnesia was I suffering from?

The video didn't answer that question; it just moved onward to other fairy tales. A so-called former homosexual, who admitted that he still struggled with temptations that are alien to other non-homosexuals, informed the audience that gay feelings represented an immature stage of sexual development at which adult gays were pathetically "stuck." Somehow, the camera never found a licensed psychotherapist to comment on that Freudian claptrap. Instead, the presumably Christian camera zeroed in on a bunch of mostly naked leathermen dancing in a gay pride parade, while the narrator identified this activity as the lifestyle that homosexuals want the public to accept as wholesome and middle-class. My lover and I endured this and other insults to both our community and our intelligence before we pushed the 'eject' button.

For me, the most disturbing part of the film was an interview clip with a conservative M.D. The guy gave what amounted to a short lecture on the fecal matter that gay people can expose themselves to when they perform unprotected anal penetration or rimming. I have seldom seen such despicable propaganda. This emphasis on fecal matter had no logical relationship to the ethics of being gay; no rational argument suggests that a person's rights to a job, a spouse, and a family should depend on how he soils the sheets. The doctor's speech was strictly a gut-level gross-out, designed to make Mr. and Mrs. Mainstream America throw up whenever they lean too far in the direction of tolerance.

It saddens me to think that even people in the queer community buy into this propaganda--that some of us think of gay sex as somehow more disgusting than straight sex. Against this warped perception, some common sense observations are in order.

1.....First of all, there is no such thing as an exclusively homosexual practice. A lot of straight people engage in oral sex, anal sex, and S&M--and a lot of gay people don't. Anyone who doubts this should be hospitalized for severe naivet鮠

2.....People may believe that straight sex is cleaner than gay sex, but germs don't. Straight sex can spread disease as easily as gay sex can, so it hardly makes sense to say that one is dirtier than the other.

3.....Some people think that gay sex is disgusting because it's "unnatural." It is high time we face the mind-numbingly obvious fact that the term "unnatural," when applied to sex, has no meaning. If gay sex isn't natural, is it artificial? Is it a commodity produced in factories? If gay sex is "unnatural" because it might be learned and not innate, then why is it any worse than 99% of everything humans do, which is also learned? Are chewing sugarless gum and taking calculus disgusting because they don't come naturally to us? And if gay sex is "unnatural" because the peg is supposed to go in the hole, does that mean we have to vomit in disgust if somebody stacks one peg on top of another?

None of these questions--let alone their patent absurdity--ever occur to people who condemn gay sex as "unnatural," because describing gay sex in this manner is rank name-calling that fails to reflect even a split second of actual thought.

4.....If homosexual sex were intrinsically disgusting, straight men wouldn't be so turned on by the many scenes of lesbian sex featured in straight porn. The "disgust" that so many people feel about sex between men has nothing to do with cleanliness or traditional ethics; it's an arbitrary and stupid phobia--guess which kind!

You are not disgusting. The love you make with the one you love is not disgusting. Sure, our physical bodies are a little gross. Describe them in enough detail, guts and all, and you can ruin your appetite. But when thrilling your partner with your touch is just as satisfying as letting your partner thrill you; when that moment of ecstasy brings an end, not just to tension, but to loneliness; and when your hair, skin, flesh, and bone become messengers of love, it doesn't matter if you're gay or straight. Love is what matters, and love can never be disgusting.

BEWARE OF TRAPS.....(January 1998).....by J. Stevens

Somewhere in the universe, there are people who were raised by perfect parents in wonderful neighborhoods. These people always feel good about themselves, bear up well under hardship, and live in pure joy and contentment when times are good. These people probably have a colony on Saturn; they certainly can’t be found on Earth. We earthlings live with psychological scars inflicted not only by our parents? inexperience, but also by centuries of prejudices and superstitions accumulated by society as a whole. Our emotional scars often take the form of traps; loops of faulty logic that cycle endlessly through our hearts and minds. Caught in these traps, we make stupid decisions even though we are smart, and feel rotten about ourselves even when we have done nothing wrong.

I can’t be happy unless I am one of the best people. The best people get Ph.D.’s. Therefore, I will not be happy until I get a Ph.D.

My mother never listens to anyone. I hate that. Therefore, I will continue to lie awake at night hating my mother until she listens to me.

My father died. I loved my father. My father was a man. If I love a man, he will die, so I won’t love any men.

Some traps even make us feel good about behaving disgracefully.

Success is good. Success means getting what you want. I want to have sex with someone other than my spouse. Therefore, my marriage-ending affair proves that I am successful and good.

Some traps seem to lie in wait for certain groups of people. At the risk of sounding prejudiced, I believe the following trap has been especially dangerous for homosexual men.

Gay people are immoral. I am gay. Therefore, I am immoral. Therefore, I will rut my way through an endless succession of one-night stands.

This conceptual trap, with all its implicit homophobia and self-contempt, helped to define the underground culture of anonymous sex that made a lot of gay people untouchable before Stonewall, fashionably shocking in the ‘70’s, and dead in the subsequent age of AIDS. The trap was born in the repressive days when many homosexual unions were necessarily furtive and secretive. The trap was kept unnaturally and grotesquely alive by a sexual revolution that mistook it for gay pride.

Now that society is more open about homosexuality, more and more of us are escaping this trap by insisting on one partner at a time, and often settling down to one partner for life. More and more of us are realizing that there is nothing repressive or heterosexist about using sex as an expression of intimacy instead of a substitute for it.

Forget about the fact that limiting the number of sexual partners you have in a lifetime cuts the risk of disease. Disregard the fact that monogamy probably conforms to the religious and moral principles you believe in. You are still left with these truths: intimacy gives you someone to come home to, people are more interesting than human bodies used as stroking devices, and monogamous humans generally live longer and feel better about themselves.

By now, we should take these insights as obvious principles of personal and spiritual self-care. Unfortunately, there are still a few of us out there who equate promiscuity with gay identity--most notably a protest group called Sex Panic, which views the push for gay marriage as an outcome of guilt about AIDS and a desire to placate conservative critics.

Evidently, the naive contingent of gay left wing is setting a new trap for us:

Following tradition is part of having integrity. Traditionally, gay sex was promiscuous. Therefore, the push for gay monogamy represents a craven flight from integrity.

If you believe all that, say “Bye bye love,” and “Hello, V.D.” Otherwise, you might want to walk away from this trap. There is an insight that will help you escape this and many other traps too. This insight is sort of a flip side of the Golden Rule, and goes like this:

If you won’t take it from other people, don’t take it from yourself.

If you dislike the idea of someone else selling you into a life of prostitution, maybe you’d better not egg yourself into a life of constant one-night stands. If you dislike the idea of someone else injecting you with adrenaline when you’re trying to sleep, maybe you should get counseling so you won’t lie awake at night hating people. If you wouldn’t let your mother call you a failure for not getting a Ph.D., maybe you shouldn’t lay that kind of trip on yourself.

Our rule won’t get you out of every trap, but nothing is ever perfect. Consider this rule as one of a number of tools for daily living. You don’t have to punish yourself. If you do right, it’s pointless. If you do wrong, you can let other people punish you. Be nice to yourself for a change. Regardless of past mistakes--or even past misbehavior--you can choose to treat yourself as you would have others treat you. Peace be with you in the coming year.

THE MAINSTREAM AGENDA......(May, 1998)......by J. Stevens

America is dominated by a huge tribe. Like the hunter-gatherers we read about in school, this tribe thinks of its members as “the human beings,” while classifying other people as lesser creatures. We can call this tribe the Mainstreamers. Their members are usually white suburbanites, who think of non-Mainstreamers as either ethnics or weirdoes.

Mainstreamers exhibit the cultural insularity consistent with their primitive nature. They know of only two political parties, Republican and Democrat, and only two religions --Mild-Mannered Protestantism, and Mean-Spirited Protestantism. As far as most Mainstreamers are concerned, America comprises only members of their tribe. They do not know what non-Mainstreamers are doing in America, and wish that strange groups--like the Native Americans--would go back where they came from. To be accepted by Mainstreamers, it is necessary to dress, talk, act, think, and live as they do. Conformity is highly prized in Mainstream culture; diversity is seen as a threat.

Being accepted as male in this culture involves familiarity with certain rituals; including the Fall Monday Night armored tackling ritual, the Spring wooden stick and ball ritual, and the indoor jumping-to-the-net ritual. Acceptance as a female Mainstreamer involves familiarity with many adornments, including special pastes that redden portions of the face. Mainstreamers of both sexes enjoy screaming and gyrating to crude music and flashing lights, and many engage in social bonding rituals that involve the use of psychotropic drugs: chiefly nicotine and alcohol.

Some of us would like to ignore the Mainstream tribe, but this is not possible, since the Mainstreamers are in the majority, and have the most money. Their culture, primitive though it is, has influenced damn near everybody. If minorities wish to preserve their rights, they have to understand Mainstreamers, and their agenda.

This agenda is very simple: Mainstreamers want everybody to be like them. This means that they do not want to hear about people who are different. They do not want to hear about different sexual orientations, different cultural backgrounds, or--horror of horrors--independent politics and spirituality. Hence the cry of the Mainstreamers and their sympathizers: “Why can’t we all be Americans?”

Why do we have to be Native Americans, European Americans, African Americans, Mexican Americans, Asian Americans, and GLBT-Americans? Rhetorical questions like these masquerade as calls for unity, but they are really demands for conformity. The plea for us all to come together as Americans usually occurs in the context of complaints about cultural events such as Black History Month and Gay Pride marches. The implication is that minority pride, rather than discrimination against minorities, is what divides our country, and this implication is absurd.

There are at least several reasons why we can’t all be non-hyphenated Americans. For one thing, Americans who get discriminated against are not chosen at random. They are chosen according to ethnicity, religion, politics, and even sexuality. Public displays of pride in these facets of ourselves help counteract the lies that make discrimination possible. Silence will only return us to the days when every picture of a human being in every reading primer, magazine, and book depicted a member of the same Caucasian Protestant Heterosexual tribe.

America’s minorities are not all persecuted in the same way or to the same degree. Some minorities have it tougher than others. At times, their interests conflict. To this extent, political groups special to each minority may always be necessary. But minorities cannot forget that they have common interests, including the need bring enlightenment the same belligerent tribe: the Mainstreamers.

A lot of us who were raised in this tribe would like to see our people become less primitive and more cosmopolitan. To this end, we can quit bellyaching about celebrations of ethnic, political, spiritual, or sexual identity; and thank whatever powers we believe in that we live in a world where people aren’t all the same.

NO MANHOOD IN LARAMIE......(November, 1998)......by J. Stevens

All of us are shocked, saddened, and scared about the murder of Matthew Shepherd in Wyoming. Just when we thought it was safe to talk about a post-gay culture and the need to become one with society at large, young Shepherd’s death reminds us that society has fenced us in. We are united, not by some imaginary uniformity of queer character, but by our second-class citizenship, and by the sad fact that many Americans don’t think that queers are human beings.

Some young men see only a threat to their own manhood when they see a gay man. A queer man who walks alone at the wrong time of night, or says anything at all about his sexuality or (heaven forbid) says anything flirtatious is marked for brutal punishment or even death so that the worst of our nations heterosexual male youth can preserve their warped perception of their own masculinity. What makes Shepherd’s murder all the more senseless is that this crime could not have threatened his killers’ manhood, since the nature of this crime proves that they had no manhood to threaten.

Aren’t real men supposed to fight fairly against adversaries of equal or better strength? Shepherd was a slight man, well under six feet tall, decidedly smaller and weaker than either of the men who murdered him. Yet these “real men,” these honest-to-God Wyoming cowboys, apparently lacked the confidence to face Mathhew one-on-one. Yessir, it took two strapping cowboys to lure Matt to a remote area under false pretenses. And these two amazing specimens of heterosexual manhood, these two paragons of All-American masculinity, apparently decided that two-against-one odds in their favor were not enough to prevail against so awesome a foe as Matt Shepherd. To subdue someone with Matt’s reputation for being a loving friend and a sweet-tempered young man, these two alleged “men” needed guns and rope.

America must face the bitter irony that this anti-gay murder represents the rankest betrayal of the masculine ideals that right-wing hate-mongers claim to defend. The rhetoric of homophobia never has (and never will) inspire young men to treat women with respect, to be loyal to family and community, to fight only when necessary or to strive to be decent.

Far from preserving family values or manly virtues, the anti-gay rhetoric of demagogues like Trent Lott and James Dobson encourages hate crimes. Characterize any segment of society as depraved, anti-Christian, and bent on implementing a hidden agenda that threatens manhood and the family, and you incite brutality. Appeal to the hate constituency, and they will hate and act out their hatred all the more.

The demagogues of the far right were not directly responsible for Matt Shepherd’s murder. But they were there in spirit on that October night, providing inspiration for the killers who beat and tortured an innocent man to death.

ARE YOU FLAUNTING YOUR SEXUALITY?......(February 1999)......by J. Stevens

No one should be surprised when the right wing labels alternative sexuality as unmentionable. What is surprising is the number of GLBT people who agree with this assessment. They won’t come out to their parents, because they don’t want to flaunt their sexuality. They won’t attend any gay-identified events, because that would be flaunting their sexuality. They never talk about their partners to their friends, because that would be flaunting their sexuality. They never come out to anyone and live celibate lives because ending this pointless self-denial would mean flaunting their sexuality.

It’s one thing to stay in the closet because you’re a gay preschool teacher in Oklahoma who would be fired and lynched if anyone found out. It’s another thing to be a public figure who outs himself to the national press, and then tries to explain that he’s “homosexual but not gay.” And it’s still another thing to be queer, live in a fairly progressive community like Olympia, and yet remain a stranger to the GLBT community because all those out people are just too sexual.

Sure, some GLBT people flaunt their sexuality. The guys who come to the gay pride parades dressed only in their leather jock straps do. The gals who come dressed mostly in thin strips of electrical tape do too. Arguably, this kind of in-your-face sexuality constitutes a breach of good taste and everyday discretion. But people who think that any obvious sign of queerness is just too overt for decent people should remember how heterosexuals behave.

1.....Our media are awash in images of feminine beauties reveling in heterosexual womanhood; dressed in clothes that accentuate all the parts of their figures that appeal. TV and magazines also celebrate handsome men, powerfully muscled, sensually shirtless, and obviously sexual. Not long ago, a popular commercial even depicted such an overtly sexual man ogled by women from a window. If these images can be shown to our TV-addicted children, then what could possibly be wrong with the obvious sexuality of a man with a colorful disco wardrobe, or a fine upstanding woman in her best tuxedo?

2.....Though many American men appear more businesslike than sexual, our country still has growling, beer-swilling, tobacco-chewing, crotch-scratching, foul-mouthed, hypermasculine men. In some parts of the country, these human buffaloes are respected as role models. The same is true of dainty, petite, and meticulously coifed women with voices ever-so-breathy and etiquette ever-so-perfect. Hyperfemininity is as dear to the hearts of real Americans as Thanksgiving and apple pie. Most people don’t think of hyperfemininity and hypermasculinity as overt, in-your-face statements of sexual identity, but that’s what they are. And if it’s okay to be a “real man” or a “real woman,” then what the hell is wrong with being a real queer? Butch, fem, leather, you name it?

3.....Are you flaunting your sexuality if you kiss in public? Or if you walk down the street holding hands? Or if you hug a lover returning from a long trip at the airport or the train station? Are you being too sexual if you have a picture of your lover by your desk at work? Is it too sexual to tell suggestive jokes in a bar, or glance in the direction of a handsome or beautiful person walking by? All of these things can be done in public, or shown in movies that children might see, provided that the players are heterosexual. So where do heterosexuals get off criticizing queer peers for engaging in the same innocuous behavior?

By all means, let’s be careful out there. Let’s avoid being too overt if the risk of harassment is too great. But let’s not kid ourselves that we’re inventing a new and more positive queer identity when we eliminate all traces of sexuality from our public behavior. Let’s not call it progress when we achieve the right to be straight-acting queers who never communicates anything sexual to anyone. Let’s not pretend that we can escape from oppression by estranging ourselves from the gay community and keeping our sexuality behind carefully closed curtains. Yes, if we’re careful to conceal who and what we are, the heterosexists who want to keep us in the closet won’t bother us. But then, why would they, if we do their job for them? Why would anyone bother to oppress and isolate us if we oppress and isolate ourselves?

IS LIFE OLD-FASHIONED?......(March, 1999)......by J. Stevens

There are a lot of good things to say about the youth movements that started in the nineteen sixties. As college students and other young people took up political activism, it became fashionable to care about the oppression of minorities, our responsibility to our environment, and our fellow human beings in general. There are just two problems with social movements that are generated and maintained chiefly by the young. First, youth movements tend to disappear with age. Second, the youth movements that don’t disappear with age tend to be dismissed as outdated by new generations of youth.

It’s not hard to find examples of the first problem. Not all hippies abandoned their gardens, their crafts, and their social consciences, but many did. As the Viet Nam war ended, and the struggle for civil rights went mainstream, many youth activists became yuppies, the young urban professionals of the eighties whose chief concerns were the accumulation of wealth, status symbols and creature comforts. The about-face isn’t hard to understand if you’re willing to face the fact that, for a lot of young Americans in the sixties, radical politics were a mere fad, and commitment to the oppressed was nothing more than a metaphor for liberation from parental control. Once the yuppies were old enough to get kicked out the door by their parents, their own liberation was no longer an issue, and neither was anyone else’s.

Of course, not everyone lost their social conscience in the eighties. Some of the hippies matured into well-read and hard-working craftsmen who know how to run a co-op and know who their congressmen are. Minority-rights movements persist, thanks chiefly to the efforts of the minorities themselves. Incidentally, the sixties also prepared the way for the women’s and GLBT liberation movements.

Unfortunately, the sixties have also left us the effects of generation-gap rhetoric; the notions that youth and age should not see eye to eye; that youth rebellion is always natural and good; and that any youth who accepts the wisdom of age is less than fully alive. Blind acceptance of this idea cripples social reform, by obliging the young to rebel against even the best of the reforms that their elders achieved in the past. What comes from elders is dismissed as goody-goody establishment stuff, fit for cringing dweebs, but not for anyone with an ounce of vitality or independence.

The generation-gap mentality explains why college students who listened to Dick Gregory were succeeded by college students who listened to Andrew Dice Clay. It explains why heroin was in, then out, then in again. And it explains the unconscionable stupidity of the bareback sex movement among some of today’s gay youth.

Some young people who should pay attention to elders who lost half their friends in the eighties are treating safe sex as if it were an outmoded point of etiquette, or a tiresome news story like the O.J. saga or the impeachment proceedings. Some young people think it’s hip to be sick of the AIDS issue, and hip to have promiscuous unprotected sex. It amazes me that the most well-informed generation that has ever existed could adopt such a shit-for-brains, shit-for-ethics mentality. All of ought to know that AIDS is still a killer. All of us ought to know that anyone who has unprotected sex without disclosing his or her HIV status is a killer too, no better than Manson, Bundy, and the rest of the scum.

The idea that human life is valuable is not old-fashioned. It is a moral principle that needs to be respected by young and old alike. Old people who disregard life’s value are not fountains of wisdom about the individual’s cosmic insignificance: they’re just callous bastards. Young people who flout safety on the road or in the bedroom are not bravely exploring the upper reaches of experience; they’re just being stupid homicidal shits.

It is past time we Americans take “attitude” off the pedestal; past time for us to question inexperience as fiercely as we question authority; and past time for us to embrace moral responsibility as vigorously as we demand our freedoms. Safe sex is not a fad; it’s a good grass roots social reform. Like a lot of good things, it should be handed down one generation to the next, and cherished for many years to come.

DO WE NEED NEW HATE CRIME LAWS?......(May 1999)......by J. Stevens

Not too long ago, murdered gay men were memorialized with back-page tabloid articles about deviants who got what was coming to them. Only in recent times has our nation mourned people like Matt Shepard and Billy Jack Gaither as human beings tragically lost to us. As news of the murders echoes across our country, so do demands for new hate crime laws that include language about sexual orientation.

With these demands come predictable objections from homophobic conservatives and homo-squeamish moderates. Now that the mothers of Matt and Billy Jack are talking to the media, only nut-cases like Fred Phelps are proclaiming that queers deserve to be murdered. However, South Carolina Rep. John Graham Altman (R) did come close by calling the proposed hate crime law in his state a “pedophile protection bill.” Quotes like this just go to show how lustily and hard a Republican can suck up to the hate constituency.

Cavemen like Phelps and Altman deserve only contempt, but there are softer voices whose concerns need to be taken seriously. Hate crime bills provide for tougher penalties for crimes if they are motivated by hatred of the victims' race, ethnicity, gender, or sexual orientation. Is that fair? Like it or not, this is a legitimate question. To address it, we need to examine a number of issues, including the right to hate, the equal value of human lives, and whether current laws are not sufficient to punish gay bashers.

Questions: Do hate crime laws punish hatred? In a free society, citizens have freedom of thought, and the consequent right to hate anyone for any reason. Homophobes have the right to hate queers. If a criminal receives a stiffer sentence if his or her crime is motivated by hatred of the victim’s sexual orientation, aren’t we punishing the same crimes with different penalties depending on whom the perpetrators hate? Doesn’t that violate criminals' freedom of thought? Should some convicts serve harder time for being politically incorrect?

Comment: There are some strange assumptions buried in these questions, the strangest being that crime is a form of free expression, protected by the First Amendment.

Crime is not a form of free expression. Though it is wrong to regulate hateful thoughts, and wrong to restrict hateful speech, there is nothing wrong with punishing crimes more severely when they double as expressions of hate. In a society whose Constitution guarantees even Nazis the right to publish hate literature, there is no excuse for hate-mongers to use crime as the medium for their messages. Furthermore, since hatred is not peculiar to any one group, the fear that hate crime laws will single out certain groups for persecution is unfounded. Hate crime laws don’t promote persecution; they punish it.

Hate crime laws also take something into account that the critics overlook: the relevance of motive to the just punishment of crime. Motive is relevant to punishment not only for hate crimes, but for most crimes, at the very least when it comes to sentencing. Odds are, beating a neighbor for harming your child will get you fewer years behind bars than beating your mother for money. And shooting someone who tried to torch your spouse will get you a lighter sentence than shooting a baby for sexual kicks.

Some might say that this kind of justice is unfair; that identical crimes should be punished identically regardless of motive. But those who follow this principle ignore the fact that motives have a powerful effect on the character of a given crime: that motives often make crimes different. Burning garbage on a white family’s lawn is vandalism; burning a cross on a black family’s lawn is terrorism. Slashing a face disfigures a person; carving a swastika into that face does something worse. Bludgeoning a man for his wallet leaves one man hurt; bludgeoning a man because he’s queer threatens a whole community.

It’s worth noting that hate criminals, like the hit men for hire and serial rapists, are more likely to be repeat criminals given the nature of their crimes. A woman who hates her husband has only one man to shoot; a man who hates racial minorities and queers has entire populations to prey upon again and again. Our government has the right to inflict more severe punishments on its more dangerous criminals.

Questions: Do hate crime laws give greater protection to minorities than to mainstreamers? Don’t hate crime laws make it a greater crime to kill an African American or Hispanic person than it is to kill a Caucasian? Don’t hate crime laws make the value of a queer’s life greater than that of a straight person’s?

Comment: The answer to all of these questions is “No.” Hate crime laws don’t identify specific groups as worthy of greater protection than others. They don’t punish people more harshly for crimes against African Americans and Hispanics. They punish people more harshly for crimes motivated by racism, regardless of the race of the victim. Racial minority members who commit hate crimes against Caucasians should fare as poorly under hate crime laws as any member of the Ku Klux Klan. Similarly, queers who beat people up just because they are straight can be as guilty of hate crimes as any hetero queer basher.

If it so happened that more Caucasian heterosexuals were arrested for hate crimes than minorities, this would reflect not only the greater numbers of straight whites in this country, but also obvious historical patterns of oppression. Hate crime laws that address sexual orientation are not made unfair by the fact that drag queens commit fewer hate crimes than straight white homophobic wackos.

Questions: Are hate crime laws necessary? That McKinney fellow on trial for murdering Matt Shepard may get the death penalty. If he does, would hate crime legislation make him any deader? Don’t current laws punish people enough for smashing, gouging, stabbing, smothering, burning, and shooting each other? Aren’t hate crime bills redundant?

Comment: Historically, prejudices have been used as defenses for hate crimes. All too often, getting away with queer-bashing is as easy as claiming to be shocked by an inappropriate sexual advance. Hate crime laws would help make prejudice into an aggravating circumstance instead of a convenient defense. The use of the so-called gay panic defense down through the years is a matter of shameful public record.

In Florida, 1974, Vincent Welch beat a man to death, claimed his victim made sexual advances, and got probation. In New Jersey, 1976, Alfred Smith, Jr. led police to the body of his murder victim after police informed him that, under New Jersey law, a killer could plead self-defense if the victim made a homosexual advance. In Georgia, 1979, two Army Rangers got a twelve month sentence for savagely beating a gay man to death after an alleged sexual advance. Since these men alleged that Lee made sexual advances to them, they got a twelve month maximum sentence for battery. In California, 1982, Andrew Toney claimed that his murder victim made sexual advances to him, and was acquitted. In Maine, 1984, Young Charles Howard was beaten and thrown off a bridge into a river where he drowned by three of his high school classmates. They were charged with manslaughter, implying that the killing was not an act of malice, and each was released at the age of twenty one. In Michigan, 1985, gay man Harry Wayne Watson was beaten to death by a seventeen year old who was exonerated of all charges in a jury trial because of the gay panic defense. In Michigan, 1986, Terry Kerr was acquitted of killing a gay man with a sledgehammer, even though no one denied he committed the act or that he bragged about “killing a fag” to his friends. (Sources: The Gay Book of Lists, Rutledge, 1987; Lavender Lists, Fletcher & Saks, 1990.)

From these and countless other cases, it is clear that hate crime laws will not protect the queer community unless they include sexual orientation language.

Our criminal justice system needs to recognize hate crimes for what they are: steps toward an American Nightmare in which the rule of bigotry is stronger than the rule of law. Though no conspiracy was involved in the murders of Matt Shepard and Billy Jack Gaither, these killings didn’t happen by coincidence either. Just as the law needs to recognize the existence of organized crime, the law needs to recognize traditions of hatred that flout common decency and justice. Thanks to hate crime laws, it’s not okay anymore to kill a member of a racial minority because of false and malicious allegations of rape. Hate crime laws should be updated so that alleged propositions are no longer good reasons to kill a queer.

PUNKING FOR THE GOP.....(October, 2000).....by J. Stevens (aka Bushy-Boy’s Love Toy)

I can’t hide anymore. All these years of holding my longings inside have left me old and used up. What’s left of life after years of denying my true nature? How can I face all my gay, lesbian, bisexual and transgendered friends when I’ve never told them my real reasons for becoming a gay conservative?

We’ve all heard the phony reasons for going gay-con. “You don’t have to be heterosexual to believe in limited government.” “Gays need to think more about individual responsibility.” “We can change the Republican Party from within.” I’ve used all those lines. Some of my friends even believe that crap. None of them know the truth.

The truth happened a few years ago. His name was George. He wasn’t handsome or buffed out, but those fatherly looks got me hot. The layers of hair tonic, the skinny tie and skinny belt, the starched white short-sleeved shirt with the crew-neck undershirt, and the pressed pants with no visible crotch--all that seething repressed 1950’s sexuality had me creaming in my jeans. Despite the danger, I walked up to the guy and said “Hey, buddy, wanna get it on?”

George seized my arm and said “Son, you’re a homosexual, and I’m a Texas Republican Man. And this Man needs to tell you what a perverted little sodomite you are.”

Those words made me so hard! George dragged me roughly to his motel room. I was pouting, teary-eyed, submissive--in Heaven. After he threw me onto the motel bed, George slid his skinny belt off his pants. Striking his free palm with the whip-thin leather and the cold steel buckle, he glared at me, warning me of things to come.

“Boy, assume the position!” George yelled. Moments later, with my hands clutching my ankles and my bare ass taking its best beating in years, I heard the words and sounds that make me horny even now. “The Bible says you’re an abomination!” (crack!) “You’ve had five hundred partners a year, just like all the queer scum!” (crack!) “You're unfit to marry! You?re unfit to adopt children!” (crack!) “Your boss oughtta can your ass just for being a queer!” (crack! crack! crack!)

When we were both spent and panting on the bed, I tried to give George some money for showing me a good time. "Hell no," he yelled, “I don’t want your dirty money, you piece of pansy filth!” Literally kicking my ass, he forced me out the motel door. I was left alone to long for just one more second with a Real Texas Man. In the weeks that followed, he agreed to meet with me at big hotels, only to snub me later. Oh, yes, snub me, George, snub me! Teach me how worthless I am compared to you, my Big Manly Stud!

Nowadays, I see George on the TV, but he never calls me. That’s why I had to join the Republican Party. That’s where I can hear The Men say that pansies don’t deserve fair employment. That’s where I can send my money to candidates only to have it refused. That’s where I can grovel in front of the telephone, waiting for important politicians to snub me. That’s where I have my big chance to get on the Dr. Laura show and say “Yes, I’m a biological error! Hate me! Revile me! Kick me! Please!”

It’s not enough. I still miss my big bushy boy. George, if you’re reading this, come to me! Take me! Show me your Texas Manhood with its load as big and powerful as a gusher full of black gold. Give it to me, Georgie! I won’t cry.

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