We live in a country with a legal system based on the preponderance of evidence beyond a shadow of a doubt before a man is convicted of a crime. We cherish this, rightly so. We are innocent until proven guilty. This too is a fundamental truth. We conservatives insist on factual knowledge, on experience, on logic, reason, and a fundamental truth to things. Liberals, as we all well know, live in a sort of amorphous dreams and wisps of imaginary problems, buttressed by the flimsiest logic known to mankind. Socialism, communism, progressives, liberals, social justice … oh, they use so many terms it’s hard to keep track; you know of whom I speak.
But, then, beyond all this stuff about economics and foreign policy and patriotism and entitlements and the debt and deficit and the budget, or, non-existent budget, and the current politics of our times … there’s the gay thing. The homosexual issue. Oh, I contend we are so very different that it requires an appeal to something beyond mere math, such as might be contended with a budget. The gay thing simply stands apart from every other political problem facing the nation. And so, as the gay guy who is quite conservative in every sense of the word you might imagine on any issue before the public – immigration, bank bailouts, dealing with Europe, the Fed, the IRS, the DHS – hell, all the D’s (how appropriate, so bad that they only get D’s, eh?) and well, I’d make Barry Goldwater proud – I will try to explain the dilemma.
I make my father proud too. He was a Goldwater Republican. Still is, I guess. He’s gone Reagan. Oh well, no one is perfect. But it was Goldwater who said, in 1994: “You don’t have to like it, but gay Americans deserve full constitutional right including military service and marriage.”
That’s what Mr. Conservative said while Mr. Third Way Liberal Clinton with his pants down was signing into law DADT and DOMA. Irony, yes? Yes, then there’s the gay thing. Well, my father and I have a great relationship, and he and I wrote a book together.
His life as he wanted to tell it, and my two cents. Well, that’s the “gays are anti-family” bit, yes? Isn’t that is what is said? Yes, “homosexuals are anti-family.” So be it. Maybe homosexuals are. But, alas, to reality, gay men are not. My own father doesn’t think so, I assure you.
Indeed, in my appeal, I posit this simple notion – I’m as opposed to “homosexuality” as the opponents of gay guys are. That is, this construct called “homosexuality” and its “lobby” “agenda” and “pro-gay liberals” is a myth, it’s a thing that doesn’t exist. And yes, I’m against it. But then, well, then there are us gay guys. And we don’t fit the “homosexual” mold. That’s the problem. That’s my appeal to the jury of my peers. The evidence against us is not real, and the facts are for us. We are, I hope, at least deserving of a reasonable doubt.
Let me start off with the sex. Yes. Most of you find the sex abhorrent. OK, fine. I’ll accept that. Let us then stipulate that minimally 95% of the male population is not gay. That leaves 5%, at most. Is this the real number? We don’t know. Out of all the things counted and quantified, studied and examined, the real numbers of gay men is not on the list. No one knows. Every study must, of course, reference Kinsey’s 10%. It’s a number long discredited, no one believes it, and yet, it must be referenced. Pro-or-con. This I agree, some gays use it, some heteros do. Then, there’s the 11 – count them – 11 studies by phone that were done over the decades. Gary Gates, of UCLA Williams Center – and a gay demographer, the gay websites helpfully tell me – concludes there are exactly, I kid you not: 2,491,034 gay men in America. This is the supposed latest number. Except the Gallop poll of just a few weeks ago which says that the “number” of “LGBT” [who would admit] on the phone was 3.5% – they did not break it down as to which were L, G, B, T nor provide an absolute number.
Some people use 1%, others 1.4, 1.5, 2, 2.3, 2.6, 2.9, 4, 6 – Here’s but one “study” of the number. Here’s a mind shocker – most heterosexuals think 25% of the population is gay and just 6.5% are gay according to Roberto Lopez at American Thinker conservative blog a month ago no source was given. Here’s yet another strange estimate
So, indeed, no one has a blessed clue as to how many of us there are. Once you face that, then you can conclude that any other study which purports to show that this number of gay guys are or are not doing this or that is utter bunkum. But you know, liberals are the bunkum artists, and conservatives deal with facts. So, the fact is, no one knows how many gays there are, on earth.
It is supposed that this is an American issue. That Obama is for gay marriage, and good Republicans–are–not. Except, gays – known as ‘gays’ in the local lingo worldwide, and English word run amok – are in every country on earth. Did you want to go to the Gay Pride event in Minsk, Belarus? Well, it’s there for those with the desire. How about Japan? Osaka, Tokyo, Kyoto – more, Sapporo – oh my. And Helsinki in Finland and Cape Town, Durbin and Johannesburg, South Africa, to Santiago, Chile and Buenes Aires, and Caracas, Rio, Sao Paalo, Bogata, Mexico City, Casablanca, Rome, Tel Aviv, Ankara, New Delhi – Teheran – gay people have the audacity for liberty to hold a gay pride march in Tehran! I suppose they’re attacking Allah instead of Jesus. What is that about the toughness of Tea Party conservatives with a 2nd Amendment under some rhetorical attack? Compare: gay guys got up in Teheran and said “the hell with this.” Oh, innocents.
In India there are the Untouchables. 150,000,000 souls considered, well, untouchable. The Brahmin doctors in the public hospitals for free health care refused to treat the Untouchables. And where are gays in the caste system of India? Beneath the Untouchables! Oh yes, that’s how despised we are. And what happens in Hyderabad, Bangalore, Mumbai, Calcutta, and lesser places? Gay pride marches. And you folks think this is an American issue? You think this is remotely related to any public policy issue the USA faces? Really?
If gay folks, the vast consortium of LGBTQ (I know, it’s confounding, I’m sorry, I’m not in charge) amount to a mere 5% or less of the population we are a mere 350,000,000 people out of 7 billion. Do you really all think we chose this to fight you all incessantly in every country on earth because Obama decided to come out for gay marriage? Or, that it’s not natural in some way? We appeal to your reason, and you switch to emotion. I can’t fight you on that – you know what you know, and believe what you believe, so be it. We are the pariahs of mankind, of that there is no doubt. But, well, here we are. We say we’re born gay, many of you demur, and essentially call us liars and then say it either happened to us, or we chose it, or a confab of both.
Let us face the reality too that there is, among heterosexuals, a clear division in the LGBT rainbow. Lesbians are not so bad. Oh, face it, Hugh Hefner and Larry Flynt have made millions off of displays of lesbianism. As a 20 year old I did color proofing for High Society magazine, please. Bisexuals are, well, lapsed heterosexuals, and they have wives and girlfriends, and a dash of intervention and all will be well. Transgendered are, strangely, heterosexuals.
Yes, let me explain that by pointing to the two most historically prominent transgendered people we can reference: Christine Jorgensen and Chaz Bono. Christine was a guy who became a girl who then found a guy and as a gal and guy have been happily married for decades. So, gal and guy – that’s heterosexual, yes? Now, Chastity Bono was a gal, who because a guy, who then went out and found a gal – so, guy and gal together. Last I looked, and correct me if I’m wrong, when guy and gal are together in holy matrimony or at least socially acceptable shacking up that’s heterosexual, yes? Yes. So, I will admit, wholeheartedly, that I am utterly flummoxed why Transgendered people are lumped with gay guys. Gay men are not gender confused, I assure you. Well, so, the three, L, B and T, are shall we say, OK, to some degree. Ah, but then there’s G – the gay guy. We are the butt of the problem (oh, pun intended, we are adults here.)
Yes, the gay man. And what does he do? Well, as the “homosexual” he is hellbent on destroying the nation, civilization, God, marriage, kids and anything else good and wholesome. There is no good in the “homosexual.” Well, the way that guy is described I don’t like him either. Now, then, there’s the gay guy. I can’t speak for us all. Alas, we don’t get a memo from Gay Agenda Central. In fact, almost certainly much to your surprise there is a very vigorous Republican-Liberty versus Democratic-Control debate going on on gay websites. You don’t know that because “homosexuals” might be pushing an agenda to make everyone gay instead of discussing something silly like whether the currency is being inflated out of all reason. No, gay men must perforce have an exact same opinion on say, the tax code, with nary a difference to be found, like among good heteros such as yourself and say Nancy Pelosi. Who you smooch apparently doesn’t affect your IRS meter – but, if you’re a gay guy, well, I guess it must be true that you’re for something else, whatever the gay guy position is on the IRS code is supposed to be. I don’t know it. Do you?
Meanwhile, let us be realistic that there are still American politicians calling for criminalizing gay sex. Yes, Rick Santorum and Allen West and Tony Perkins and many many others have spoken about the need to outlaw gay sex. I suppose that’s to stop heterosexuals from having gay sex. It certainly didn’t stop gay men. Why, that’s why we were arrested in police raids on bars – for liberty. Oh, don’t worry, gay men paid for those raids, with our tax dollars.
We also must face the fact that this ridiculously small percentage are the only gay folks, we’re not trying to make anyone gay, and we know well we can’t, for, well, you’re born gay or you are not. And the vast majority of you are not gay, and never will be. And yet, it seems the fear that if a nice word is said about the few gays folks every heterosexual will run down to the local gay bar to find some sex. It’s strange, this belief, but that has to be it. We “choose” to be gay, so, if something nice is said about it, everyone else will choose to be gay, and then what? Only, well, no one chooses, and no one turns gay. And so the fear or worry is completely unfounded.
Strangely, groups like NARTH, AFTAH, FRC, AFA, NOM – oh, fine groups I’m sure, even if a tad gay obsessed – they are sure that we make up 1% of the population, that we are richer and more well off than everyone else, that we are gay because our father, mother, uncle, man down the block, predisposition and choice made us gay (or any combo) and that we are also demented, sick, ill, childish, absurd, unnatural and worse. And so, people who would seem to be unfit to make a go of life are also just doing stupendously! I’ll let you figure that one out.
Then too, there are the various reasons we are gay. Conservatives, as I know them, wish to know causes and fact, and to drop dogma and wishful thinking – until it comes to gay folks. Then they jump onto the merry go round of why guys are gay with wild abandon. Have you seen the list? It’s incredible. My my, so many reasons, for a tiny bunch, but 1 reason for 95%. It seems gay men have such powerful minds and wills that we are able to turn off instinct and nature itself; science has not seen fit to study the anomaly.
Actually, since gay men are the majority of the 5% LBGT, I’ll say 3% gay men – OK – AFTAH says it’s because our mothers were strong and our fathers absent – OK, so there would be no black teenage pregnancy problem in America today – they’d all be gay for having strong mothers and absent fathers. Not to worry, Ann Coulter and others blame gay guys on the black teen pregnancy problem. I suppose we get them pregnant after our hours and hours of gay sex. I don’t know.
The late Charles Socarides, a doctor, with NARTH, is sure it’s the weak father and cloying mother – only, he has a gay son, a “homosexual lobbyist” even, and well, there’s tension there, yes?
The Family Research Council is sure there’s predisposition and a choice – I suppose we are predisposed to choose. The predisposition is not further explained, except, it’s not genetic or natural. So, somehow, we’re both naturally predisposed and unnaturally predisposed – and we choose to be gay too later on. I don’t know. I’m not in the business of purveying the mush, merely to present it. They also put out an information package pointing out that gay men die at the age of 41. This is news to me as I approach my 55th birthday. It’s their mush, ask them.
The Catholic Cardinal of Chicago, Mr. George, says that his gay nephew is a fine man while homosexuals are intrinsically disordered and evil and destructive to society. I will leave to you all and the Cardinal the division of proportion of how much “fine man” and how much “evil” the nephew might possess. Or, I submit, one or the other proposition – fine or evil – is off the wall. But you can’t be a “fine” and “evil” at the same time, can you?
It is well known that liberals despise the military and avoid serving. It’s not so well known that it was Log Cabin Gay Republicans and serving soldiers who challenged DADT and had won in the lower courts and were going to win higher up when Obama decided to join the bandwagon. He fought the case at first, after he lost he changed his mind. Oh don’t let his evolving and following be confused for leadership. The man hasn’t led on anything ever – now you think he’s at the forefront of gay issues? Egad. We rightly claim he’s a bumbling idiot, and then on the gay thing you think he’s changing America. He’s just another heterosexual who’s “Evolving.” Every heterosexual is evolving on the issue, you can’t get away from the discussion.
Meanwhile, gay men up and joined the military, lied as best they could to do it, at the behest of DADT and heterosexuals in general, and you still hunted them down and chased them away. The nation was in need of linguists – we had 400 linguists in the languages we needed – oh, I’m sorry, they were gay – what could they do to help the nation? – after all – it must be true that these Americans who learned Dari, Pashtun and Urdu were hellbent on destroying America by demanding a shred of decency and the ease of the legal regime of marriage. Or, the homosexual does one thing, and the gay guy another.
Which brings me to marriage. The Supreme Court is considering two cases. Two so far. There’s more in the pipeline. Even if we lose this round there’s plenty more cases, we are determined fellows. In Helen Branson’s mid-1950s book “Gay Bar” attests: gay men were for marriage, and used the word, in the 1950s. This has been a goal since the beginning. Every group, every plea, every court case, every begging has been directed towards a decent recognition of our relationships and our humanity. That’s the gay goal. It’s not political, it’s social. Meanwhile, there is the construct of the homosexual goal of destroying the place. Nothing could be father from the truth. All evidence shows it.
In fact, gay folks have jobs or own businesses. We have to, there are no public programs for us, no. We aren’t the unwed mothers on welfare. We’re not the people getting disability – even though many are quite sure being gay is some disability indeed, we still have to make our own money. So, we do. The National Gay & Lesbian Chamber of Commerce claims 1.4 million members. Say ½ are gay – that’s a lot of business folks, yes? I would think that gay folks pay roughly $100 billion in taxes. It’s a guess. And AIDS, always the big gay concern, costs about $2 billion total. And the defense of DOMA by Congress is costing $3 million. And other than that, gay men don’t get any services as gay men, but we sure pay for you folks – we add $98 billion to the pot for unwed mothers and abandoning fathers. We’re a net plus to the nation, obviously.
The clearest evidence that you can see on the difference between “homosexuality” and gay guys? Think about the next time you fly and get a hotel and rent a car and eat out. Look carefully at the young man who is tending your needs. The desk clerk, the waiter, the man who takes your credit card and brings your kid a glass of water – they are gay men. That’s the people you fear – the people who make sure you food is hot, your water is cold, your wine is chilled and your bed is comfy – while you all fly hither and yon denouncing homosexuals gay men are politely helping you do it. And it is this reality versus the myth that I bring to your attention. Why Conservatives go from fact, reason and logic based people on matters of public policy and then switch to pure emotion and religious dogma without a shred of fact, logic or reason on gay folks is something I don’t understand.
I don’t say these things to tell you gay folks are wonderful or that we are innocent of sin, or that you have to like us – but I tell you because you are as against the “homosexual” as I am, but I wish to speak to you as a gay American, who is not the “homosexual” of your thinking, and tell you, we are simply so unimportant, and so different, that the whole “left-right” divide disappears. With gays it’s a whole new territory.
Jim, that was a very interesting and enlightening read. Funny, too, at some points. There are two main thoughts that I have, after reading your piece(but not necessarily because of reading it).
-One, I don’t see this as a “national” issue. It is a social issue, and if I am to be consistent, social issues, such as the poor, the unwed mothers burdening the welfare system, and the like, are issues for the States, and/or the local communities and governments. Regardless of sexual orientation, one should never strive towards the recognition that DC has power over their lives, as that means control, and the massive consolidation of power and control in DC already has become a burden on We, the People, our businesses, our daily lives, and the property and wealth we acquire(or aspire to acquire).
I’m not sure why some people who live in, say, Oklahoma, should ever be concerned when, say, Vermont decides to recognize same-sex marriage. It doesn’t affect them in the slightest. But, by the same token, I do not understand the insistence by the LBGT crowd to harangue and harass those same kind of states like OK, because they haven’t passed a law allowing same-sex marriage.
And the reason is this; Our country was founded upon a union of individual Sovereign states. It was not founded as “one nation”, despite what the Pledge might state, or what current progressives might believe. Therefore, and this goes for all social issues, just because one state is more “friendly” towards certain social justice issues, should not mean that all other States should follow suit. We have a thing in this country called free association. Meaning, one can move from state to state, for reasons entirely their own, to fit whatever lifestyles they choose to live, or whatever business atmospheres are more conducive to their success, or whatever tax system provides them a more secure financial future, etc. Heck, people and businesses in CA are moving away from that state for precisely those last two reasons above.
Basically, I believe that the less that a centralized government has control over your lives, the better off you will be, whether you are white, black, yellow, gay, lesbian, short, tall, fat, skinny, etc. Because, and this is the important part, when that happens, you, as a person, retain more freedom and liberty for yourselves, and the local community you reside in, and the State where you live.
-And the second thought is this; The “in your face” attitude towards addressing what some think is a problem turns people off. This same attitude was prevalent amongst the OWS crowd, so that even if some of their points might have been valid, the attitude itself diminished their message. You see the same thing happen in many aspects and issues in life, where the “in your face” attitude simply turns people off from what otherwise might be truly important points to consider.
Thank you for the article. It was well-written and filled with well-thought out points to ponder.
Jim H., I enjoyed your read.
I second everything johngalt had to say, as well.
I would remind you of a terrific writer (who happens to be gay) by the name of Bruce Bawer.
Bruce wrote YEARS ago* that – by being quiet and getting on with their lives – gay couples had been rebranded as ”married” in many European countries.
In other words, marriage, then all that comes with it, came to homosexual couples by default.
They lived it and were rewarded as being it after time proved their point better than any shouting, screaming or hanging one’s bare butt out from a float on a parade could ever do.
(I live where there is an entire Gay Pride Month as well as many parades, Jim. Long Beach, CA.)
*2001
http://www.brucebawer.com/marriage.htm
@johngalt: @Nan G:
Every now and then Jim Halvac shows up here whining and moaning about his “gayness.” He and I have had lengthy arguments about his view that the poor gays are simply not being treated fairly. It is all b/s. No body cares what he does in his private life. What some do care about is the fact that he, and others like him, are trying to shove their personal lives down the throats of others who, for what ever reason, object to having his “gayness” forced on us as a normal state of life.
@retire05:
Sorry, but I’ve never felt like Jim has ever tried to “shove his gayness” anywhere around me or anyone else here. Certainly not to the point that I’d ever include him in the group from that second thought I addressed above.
I would like to point out that quoting Goldwater in his dotage is skating on thin ice. He was 83 when he married the 2nd time, and that marriage lasted to the end of his life (roughly 6 years.) His 2nd wife acted as a spokesperson for him, and while he was declining, I think a lot of the quotes that are attributed to Goldwater were not from his lips (or his fully functioning mind), but in the form of press releases that reflected his wife’s views. Reagan may have uttered some heresy in his last years, thankfully his family shielded him from public view while he was in decline.
Jim Hlavac,
A bit of a serendipitous gush, but enjoyed the read nonetheless. I appreciate that you feel challenged by the sometimes incongruous conservative sensitivities toward homosexuality – here’s hoping that you hold steadfast on your ‘conservative’ principles.
IMHO, none of us can fully empathize with others since we are not them and have not lived their experiences. We can sympathize or commiserate, but empathy is beyond our human capacity. Unfortunately, within each ‘segment’ of our society, or in each wilful ‘grouping,’ there is extreme behaviour which gets extrapolated to the rest of the group. That gets used by those working against such, as we witnessed in the last Presidential election.
Over the years, I did a great deal of shopping in San Francisco’s Castro district and Nan G’s comment above reminds me of walking half a block to a restaurant behind black leather chaps and a black vest being the only clothing of a not so pretty bare ass strutting just a few feet ahead. We can’t un-see what we’ve seen – shheeesshhh. The residuals can be a bitch. It’s that ‘colorful’ but ‘fringe’ behaviour which leaves a most effective imprint, even though we know that it is not ‘representative’ of the whole. I have and have had too many gay friends to not know that intimately.
This is perhaps some of what is reflected in retire05‘s comment in #3 “….. object to having his “gayness” forced on us as a normal state of life,” when he uses the term “forced.” If not, I apologize to retire05 for assuming.
There is no question in my mind that Obama did not “evolve” to support, or “join the bandwagon”, he simply ‘pandered’ and it worked. Pandering always has long term negative consequences. Like you, I really wish the political divide avoided intrusion into personal lives, and that elements of human nature such as sexuality did not become political fodder so readily manipulated to stoke the fires of intolerance. Not only do I not want a centralized government overreaching into our lives, I don’t want de-centralized governments doing so either – state, provincial or local.
@johngalt:
So have you actually read his previous entries on this blog? For I most certainly have. And “mush” would aptly describe his own blog.
He has no argument when faced with logic. He is a “gay” man who is not content to just be allowed to live his life as he wishes. He also has an agenda (as do I, I fully admit) and comes here to push it. Perhaps it is because traffic at his own blog is dismal.
So what was his point? Gays pay taxes. So what? So do “straights.”
“The desk clerk, the waiter, the man who takes your credit card and brings your kid a glass of water – they are gay men.”
So what? Does that mean that ALL clerks, waiters, men who take your credit card and brings you a glass of water are gay? How’s that for sterotyping? None of the gays I know work in such menial jobs.
Gays can’t marry? Really? In what state does it ask on a marriage application if you are gay? Gay men are more than able to marry a gay woman. It’s not that people like Jim want the right to marry, they already have that, it’s that they want to redefine the perimeters of traditional marriage. It’s just that simple. He goes on about how the “plight” of gay men is just like the struggle of African-Americans and women to acheive equality. Really?
Then, once again, I asked Jim to explain to me how I can tell someone is gay simply by looking at them, because I can damn sure tell the difference between a man and a woman and an African-American from a Asian.
I leave him to you. I’ve been down this road with him before and frankly, he has no answers to logical questions; just an agenda to push.
@retire05:
That’s fine, retire05. Different experiences, different viewpoints.
@retire05:
Sir, I may be cranky, and gay, but, please spell my name correctly. It’s Hlavac. It is a small courtesy, I know, but I was brought up to spell folks’ names the way they wished, and the way they are. And I’d hate to see some poor innocent Jim Halvac get in trouble over my words. Thanks.
Mr. Retire05 — I do love the parry, trust me. Why, I’d be we could enjoy a good beer as we threw barbs at each other. I’m well aware of all the anti-gay arguments. I’m also not responsible for all the gay folks, some of whom might have rubbed you the wrong way, or, maybe it’s just the concept of our existence. In the latter case I really wish I had an answer, but, I don’t. Meanwhile, since we’re here, and we need to stop the socialists, I’d take the gay votes if I could get ’em.
@johngalt: Thank you very much.
@johngalt: Thank you for reading Jim’s post – he has long been a friend of mine. TO answer your question about why gay people in Oklahoma shoulod have the right as well as in Vermont – it’s an issue of equal treatment under the law, and our perfectly “natural” right to choose a mate (that will have us, lol) and tend to our affairs without the interference of the state. By granting special dispensations and rights (some 1800) to married couiples, yet denying two committed people of the same sex thos esame rights, it is an egregious affront. We have property that can be protected to an extent by jumping through legal hoops at a great cost. Our children, not so much. If the adoptive parent dies, the partner, who may well hav eraised the child for fifteen years, has no rights, and th child will be taken fomr the home and place iwth the state or foster care.
Pensions, etc. are lost, when heterosexually married couples get extended benefits.
But more seriously and to the point is that the only proscriptions against gay marriage are religious ones – scientific study shows that children raised in same sex households behave and perform identically to heterogenous ones. If the schools, psychologists, and peers cannot tell, then exactly what is wrong with it? In fact children oif gay parents are held to a higher standard of conduct.
(I’m gay, always have been 100% not interested in womaen, though I have many female friends. at 60, it does not look like i willl be growing out of this phase.)
If you had not been taught tha thomosexuality was wrong, and you met a gay person who was interested in you, do you think you’d simply say “no thank you”? Saying no seems to be an option most gay fearing heteros have forgotten. Do you think you’d see a problem with people living their lives as they want, knowing not a single hair on the head of a child was harmed? I don’t think you would.
But as Jim says, we get accused of all kinds of stuff.
@Jim Hlavac:
Well, folks, there you have it. Anyone who doesn’t support Jim’s political agenda will be labeled “anti-gay.” Is it not possible to not support same-sex marriage and yet not be anti-gay? Obviously, Jim doesn’t think so. So, without actually saying so, he slaps that “anti-gay” label on me by indicating my objections to his pathetic whining is nothing new to him.
Look, if you want to participate in activies that I, frankly, find unnatural, that’s your business. But it doesn’t just end with your ability to do what you wish in the privacy of your own home, does it? It extends to the gay “lobby” pushing for kindergartners being taught that being gay is just as normal as having blue eyes, or demanding that gay teens be allowed to have clubs in high school when we are failing to teach them how to do simple math.
So, because of your pathetic website with no traffic, you come here, once again, to push the gay “lobby” agenda, which is to be declared a “priviledged” segment of our nation. That I find reprehensible.
@James Raider: I found the Castro appalling too, Greenwich Village in NYC was more to my liking, more sedate. There are some crazy gay folks, in your face, way too out-sex rather than say, just walking with a boyfriend, I agree. I think one reason is that gay men never got relationship training, never got any moral guidance, though it’s more complex than that, here’s not the place. Then too, some gay men were just fed up, especially after Bowers v. Hardwick, and again after listening to guys like Rick Santorum in the recent election round. I think, however, if one is constantly told that one is a sex crazed liberal one sort of becomes one. In a sense, hetero society taught gay folks how to behave, to a degree. I’m not sure what to do about it.
@retire05: Sir, you’re not “anti-gay” — I contend you are anti- homosexual, and gay men are not this creature.
@ted baldwin:
Equal rights under the law? Perhaps you would like to answer the question Jim has always refused to answer: in what state of our Union does there appear the question “Are you gay” on any marriage license application?
The reason Jim would not answer that is because it does NOT appear, not in any state. You, as a gay, are perfectly free to marry under the same rules and guidelines as those you refer to as “straight.” Now, that is something I have always wondered about; why gays refer to heterosexuals as “straight.” Does that mean that gays are crooked?
That is not true. A study released in the last couple of years showed just the opposite. But the author of the study was promptly demonized by the gay community, so much so that the death threats against him caused him to relocate his family. You see, the gay “lobby” only subscribes to free speech, or the studies that don’t disagree with them, but God forbid someone does. They will be attacked with all the vitriol the gay movement can muster.
In many states, there is no guarantee of spousal inheritance. Many states have a “child’s share” law that in the event of the lack of a will, the spouse would be required to pay their children for the home they live in and paid for resulting in the sharing of the half of the property owned by the deceased. i.e., your married. You and your spouse owns a home jointly. The spouse dies without a will and the state requires a “child’s share.” The law says that the half owned by the deceased is shared equally between the spouse and the number of children. Say there are two children; the surviving spouse now owns their 50%, and 1/3rd of another 50%, basically owning 67% and now has to pay the children 13% of the value or sell. Being a heterosexual married couple is by no means a guarantee of full inheritance. It all depends on the laws of the state.
Also, in no state where an adoptive parent has sole custody of a child, does their partner, or spouse, have an automatic claim to that child. It will be settled by the courts if there is not specific will instructions regarding the child. But a gay person, just as with a straight person, can appoint their partner as the child’s guardian and custodian, if there is no other parent to take the child under joint custody orders. Even then, it is always under the purview of the court, at which point a advocate would have been assigned to the child.
So the argument basically boils down to one thing: money. Homosexual couples are not allowed to claim the $255.00 Social Security death benefits or claim SS benefits as surviving spouses. That is the long and the short of it. But there are few gays who are actually honest about their true agenda.
@Jim Hlavac:
You can label yourself anything you want, Mr. Hlavac, frankly, I don’t care if you call yourself a petunia. But you are a homosexual, and no amount of moderizing the term changes that. I really don’t understand why you are ashamed to call yourself what you are.
Also, to be very blunt about it, you know nothing about me except for the fact that I object to your agenda and for that, you will apply some label upon me.
@Jim Hlavac: #14,
1. The world in practical terms, at least the North American corner of it, has changed since 1986 and generalization to the whole is unreasonable.
2. Santorum promoted some fiscally conservative policies which were positive, while at the same time making his feelings on sexuality known which backed him into the ‘extreme’ corner of the right. He represents the generic challenge for the political right – unfortunately. His views on the more overwhelmingly critical economic health of the Nation became submerged by his opinions on social and personal mores. He’s only an example, and I’m not suggesting he’d would otherwise have made a good President. Sadly, Obama plucked low hanging fruit by going ‘pro-gay,’ but then it was easy for him, he seems to have no principles which I’ve been able to discern. None. And now, the country is being led by a proven incompetent, right into a financial quagmire because almost all gay people voted for him – Ok I’m exaggerating a little. The government should stay the hell-out-of the Nation’s bedrooms, unless there is willful harm being perpetrated.
Come on Jim, you know better than this. We can’t blame others for our actions, . . . well, we can and we do, but it is neither reasonable nor ingenuous. You can blame being rebellious, or unruly by ‘nature’, but you don’t become something you’re not, although you can certainly take behaviour to somewhere way off the beaten path. You behave as you wish to.
@ted baldwin:
I believe that you missed my point I was making to Jim, and that might be my fault for not making it clearer.
My point was that using the federal government to advance your cause is not necessarily the best way to go about it. In fact, I’d say that doing so is the worst way to go about it. Why? Because giving the government the power over what you believe is a right, gives them the power to take and give as they see fit. And since the government will not always be inhabited by peoples friendly to your cause, you might wake up in the future to see the gains you have made have disappeared. Or other rights that you thought you had.
Win the hearts and minds of the people, and your cause will be advanced faster and further than you ever could have hoped. But use the federal government as the bludgeoning tool, and the people will forever be wary and confrontational to you.
I’d think that Jim, being a conservative, would understand exactly what I’m talking about.
I think that I should point out that I’m not in favor of the “social conservatives” using government to advance their causes either. Giving government, any government, but especially the federal government, power over your lives, in any manner, makes no sense at all if you truly believe in freedom and liberty.
@James Raider: Rick Santorum is clear he wasn’t to outlaw gayness, well, “sodomy” — leaving the nation will millions of brand new felons, ready to be arrested, and incarcerated. I dare say that’s not fiscal prudence or liberty, to arrest millions of people, rip them out of their jobs and business, and put them on the public dime in prison forever. It’s a theological tyranny.
as for gay folks grow up — in hetero homes — where they hear all about homosexuals — with everyone not having a clue they’re gay. What do you think we learn in this hetero environment? It not how to be straight, that’s for sure.
@James Raider:
So Obama has no principles for going “pro gay” while Rick Santorum was actually a great candidate who was just backed into the “extreme” corner by, what, his extreme bigotry? But let’s not dwell on Saint Rick. The moral is that Obama fecklessly took an anti-bigotry stance, and look where that’s gotten us.
I first feel that I must say that I am straight. I also try to look at new things I learn from as many angles as I think I need. I don’t let others tell me how to think like I used to. I think for myself.
I challenge anyone to prove to me that gays CHOOSE to be gay. I have listened to many gays talk on different shows over the years, and not one said they CHOSE to be gay. Just the opposite. They All said it was just something that happened, and they had no control over it. Many of them tried to live the strait life to keep from being ridiculed, beaten, or killed, but finally decided to admit they were gay.
Has anyone else ever wondered why it is only the religions that condemn being gay? Could this be how they helped spread their religion. Hitler and other dictators used a group of society to get the rest of the people to hate so that attention was drawn away from what the person or group was actually doing. Hitler used the Jews. If you were Jewish, you were scum. Some religions used torture and killings to spread their religion. Join it or suffer. The Catholic church was one of them. This is how they spread around the world.
I do believe that marriage should stay the union of a man and a woman. Gays should come up with another name that they are content with that would mean a union between the same sex. This way they are still separate, but then they can have their unions.
I have said this before: You either choose which sex you prefer, or it is natural. For those of you who say the gays choose to be so, at what age were you when you chose to be gay? Do you honestly think people would choose to be gay, knowing how they are going to be treated by most people? How dumb do you think they are?
There are thousands of babies born every year who have ALL of the male AND female parts. The term is hermaphrodite. Did they choose to be born half boy and half girl? No. The doctor usually asks the parents if they want a boy or girl, and makes it so ON THE OUTSIDE. The doctor can’t change the inside, and they are still half and half. I’m guessing the parents never tell their child about the operation, so imagine how confused that child is when they feel like a boy sometimes, but like a girl at other times. The operations should be stopped, and let the individual decide if they want anything done after a certain age. A doctor told me that this is where the cross-dressers come from. Since they didn’t choose to be born that way, we should learn to accept them as they are, and I do.
One simple question: How does someone being gay or transgender harm anyone else? We have enough problems in the USA, and the world, without CREATING one more.
Jim, excellent rant! Rich in hyperbole, and low in logical calories. Definitely a fun read.
I’m coming a little late to this game (I just got around to doing some catching up) so this probably won’t get read, or it has been closed down, but there are a couple of things I’d like to say.
You decry being tarred with the “Castro Street” brush, yet you use the same generalizations in your missive, and you claim to want “equal rights” (though it has been pointed out that you already have the right to marry any woman who will have you). And I guess I don’t understand the difference between “homosexual” and “gay”. But allow me to move on.
As a conservative with strong libertarian tendencies, I support your right to do whatever you want in the privacy of your own home. I may not agree with it, and I may think that you shouldn’t be doing it, but as long as it doesn’t include “hittin or stealing” (infringing on someone else’s basic human rights), then you’re free to go for it.
I also don’t believe the government ought to be involved in the marriage business any more. Since contraception and abortion have effectively separated sex from procreation, the state no longer has as strong an interest in supporting sterile marriages (which most marriages are y choice, and all homo partnerships are by design).
So I say get the government out of marriage. I believe that being required to get government permission before I receive a sacrament from my church is a violation of the First Amendment to the Constitution (and if my priest solemnizes my wife and my marriage without a licence he’s liable for a $500 fine, a year in jail or both). Let’s leave marriage to the churches. If your church wants to marry gayfolk, they can go ahead and do it. If they don’t want do they don’t have to.
Let’s set up a contract called a “Domestic Partnership” with all the rights and responsibilities of marriage. Make this “Domestic Partnership” available to any two people regardless of gender or family relationship. Two men could “partner”, a man and a woman could “partner” and each would get exactly the same benefits. As a matter of fact, a brother and sister could “partner” or a father and son.
So when you get married in your church, you could do it with or without state entanglement. Your choice. So if this is about “equal rights”, it should be acceptable, and I will support you in the advocation and passage of it.
But if your agenda is to force society to accept your sexual proclivities as normal, and thereby tear down the institution of marriage (as damaged as that institution is at this point), and force everyone else to support your particular sexual activity and faux marriage, expect me to fight you tooth and nail. Not because I hate gay people because I don’t, but because I love my society and don’t want to see it hurt any more than it already has been.
@Tony: Tony, thanks. The topic is really too big for a blog post — that’s why I can never get everything in I want to say, or deal with every nuance — I’m well aware of the difficulty in explaining the whole thing — and I’m working on a book on the matter. But if I get a blog post, during this time when it seems everyone and their mother is talking about “gay marriage” and gay this and gay that, I’m throwing my polemics out there, like heterosexuals throw their polemics without much logic. Egad, we’re such a play toy at the moment — I can’t wait for the whole discussion to be over — which it will be one day. We have gone from 100% scorn to oh, somewhat less than 50% in some 60 years of saying “No!” to everything ever said about us. As the Jews say: the impossible takes a little longer.
As I joke, never before has so much been said by so many over so few.
Tony. Radical liberals seized on gay marriage as a way to agitate and divide the gays against conservatives. It was going to happen sooner than later when gay people started being open about their lives. By pushing for it too early they intended to keep it wedged between us. Then a funny thing happened. People started accepting the idea that gay people wanted to formalize commitment. The polls tipped over recently. Now more Americans approve of gay marriage than do not. This is robbing leftists of their prized wedge issue. Now they are attacking saying they really want to destroy marriage and that is what it really is all about.
It is not.
We want to marry the person we love, just as you straights can do. But he left wants to keep us agitated and in an uproar.
As a culture we honor marriages. so do gay people. We help put on the most beautiful ones!! In time you will meet gay married people who are flgreat as a couple and some who are terrible. Just like straights. I hope the good ones enrich your life.
@Jim Hlavak:
Thank you for a great and inspiring speech! I have only recently joined in the gay marriage discussion here, and have grown weary of the intransigent opposition. It is refreshing to find someone offering some fresh perspectives.
Much like you, I hold many conservative principles dear: small government, fiscal restraint, states’ rights etc., but we differ on party support. While I agree with virtually all of your logic (and for once there IS some) I cannot support a party (Republican) which has for my entire life fought against every single incremental advance in gay civil rights.
The progress has been slow and halting more often than not, and there has certainly been a dearth of courage amongst Democrats, politics and job security being what they are. But every little inch forward has come at the hands of Democrats, and I cannot abandon them.
Bill Clinton tried to honor a campaign promise to end the military’s exclusion of gays, but when faced with a very real and unprecedented threat of military rebellion over the issue, managed to craft a compromise everyone could hate: “Don’t-Ask-Don’t-Tell.” Gays weren’t at all happy with DADT, and the military did everything they could to circumvent the spirit of it, but DADT WAS a step forward.
A decade later, another Democratic president (Obama) has taken several overly cautious steps toward gay civil rights. Overly cautious, yet historic. With an abundance of tail-wind, Obama ended DADT. He pushed. More-so than on marriage equality, which he had to be dragged to – as he “evolved” – by his vice-president. When the resulting heat was less than expected, he gave a nice inaugural speech that included us – a proud moment.
No amount of criticism of the pace of Obama’s “evolution” or the political calculations that seem to drive it lessen the fact that the astonishing pace of progress on the gay-rights front would be considerably less had it not been for Obama’s endorsement. No Republican candidate who supports ANY gay rights has ever had a serious chance of winning the Republican nomination for president.
Every legislative step forward has been a Democratic initiative; every ATTEMPT at progress has come from the left side of the isle. The gains we have made at the SCOTUS have been at the hands of the liberal justices. Were it not for them, we would still be criminals.
Your suggestion that gay rights should be a conservative value convinces Democrats but not Republicans. I live in Virginia, a state that continues to fight for the Confederacy of Jefferson Davis. I am no longer sure that gay civil rights should be left to the states.
I have quietly waited my whole life for real equal rights, and have seen my patience rewarded with indifference and stagnation. The closet truly accomplished nothing. I now speak up, and will continue to vote Democrat until the Republican Party does something – anything at all – to forward equal rights for gays.
In polite response to Mr. Wells’ opinion I offer the alternative view that the liberal radicals running this country see gay people as nothing more than an ATM. Obama had complete control of house and senate for two years and did nothing NOTHING to advance gay rights. So little was done that the big gay donors pulled their money out of DNC. This prompted the love and kisses gay cocktail party at the White House. And when they became disgruntled again before the election he had a private fundraiser with the gay elite in hollywood. DADT was eliminated because of a lawsuit by the Log Cabin Republicans. Obama fought it until it they were obviously going to lose, then he presided over months more of delay while people discussed it.
Obama is glad to take credit for it though.
Gay people are pawns used cynically by Obama to further his own ends and nothing more. Hillary at least has gay friends.
There are no gay people in Obama’s WH and campaign (and few blacks).
McCain had mostly gay people running his campaign.
It’s not about appearances, its about who is actually doing what.
When the house was going to put forward a national marriage amendment it was the Log Cabin Republicans who went to conservative senators and congressmen and calmly approached from the standpoint of state’s rights. This ended majority support for the amendment.
Obama is beholden to the Middle East and their views on homosexuality. He cannot appear to be too much in favor of it, and we don’t know what he tells them, but my guess is he is seen as anti gay overseas. Which he needs to be seen as.
I’d rather support republicans who are against gays than a democrat that pretends to be for them. At least if the republican ever sees the light you can trust that it is the true position.
And while it is true that anti gay people support republican candidates, it is also true that there are many gay republicans, and congresspeople whose staffers are openly gay. The tide is turning.
I am gay, and regularly testify at the Louisiana legislature. We are getting bills heard and politely so that would have been impossible ten years ago. But voting in democrats on the promise of gay rights? Never believed them, never will. Democrats in Louisiana defeated a simple bullying bill that would have helped teachers stop aggression against kids perceived to be gay. Thanks guys!
Unfortunately radicals see gays the way they saw blacks in the fifties and sixties – easily led astray and duped, for the promise that never comes.
I have my rights – given to me by God. All I want to do is enforce the constitutional protection of those rights, and stop people from unfailry discriminating against me. Life. Liberty. Happiness. For all.
@Ted:
Ah, but Ted, the promise IS coming. In state legislatures that pass gay marriage, it is the Democrats that carry the issue, not the Republicans. In states that have upheld anti-gay amendments, the Republicans have supported them in EVERY case and it was the Democrats who led the unsuccessful opposition. It is the “BLUE” (predominantly Democratic) states that HAVE passed gay marriage, not the “RED” ones. You count and tell me how many Republican senators and congressmen/women have supported gay-friendly legislation of any stripe. VERY few.
The Log Cabin Republicans are not voting on these issues, and their lobbying is ineffective against an evangelical base that has elected Republicans cowering in their offices. Democrats may be short on courage when popular opinion differs, but when momentum turns for us, elected Democrats have no similar constituency to fear. There is simply NO progress on gay rights that can be credited to elected Republicans. That is why I vote to elect Democrats, and will continue to do so until the Republican Party stops opposing gay rights.
The Log Cabin Republicans’ participation in court cases is welcome, as is the help from the ACLU. But they alone cannot move mountains, and the rest of the Republican Party is not about to help. Talk about cynical exploitation! The RNC tolerates the Log Cabin Rs because you give them a modicum of cover on the diversity/inclusion issue. Do you REALLY think they’re happy to have you?
Politics is more about money than about people, for sure, and any constituency flush with disposable income is ripe for the plucking. Gays fit the bill – no surprise. That’s how the gayme is played.
@ted:
Since I can visually identify a person is black, or Hispanic, or Asian, please explain to me how I can visually identify a person as a homosexual.
@retire05:
It’s called “Gaydar,” and you either have it or you don’t. It’s about 90% accurate, maybe a bit more. It is often effect when only a photograph is available, so the visual component of the sense is considerable. Other factors include olfactory distinctions and audible characteristics. While use of the term began as a joke, gay people learned to depend on the sense back when homosexuality was criminalized and out-right asking the question carried unacceptable risk.
You do have a sense of humor R05!
One can see in many senses. You cannot tell who is Californian for the most part, but if they announce who they are to you, you will be able to “see” them in a new light, or wahtever light you cast upon them. Which to my recollection is an interesting take. Now that is a figurative “take” not a literal one, so please don’t think that I think you actually “take” gay people.
“Gaydar” is a way of seeing, but I do not think you are posessed of such a faculty. And not every Democrat has that, not even the gay ones. Soi it’s a political calculation by the liberal elite made upon those desperate for public recognition that they are indeed worthy and capable people, even if it only to function as a cash repository. (Yes, repository, since all money actually belongs to the liberal elite.)
The ability of gay people to detect other gay people is a very, very, very, very, tightly closely guarded secret, but I will give you a clue- almost every gay person you encounter will have two eyes, a nose, and some sort of chin. Even you can see those!
@George Wells:
@ted:
ROTFLMAO
Yeah, you can tell someone is gay, that is why Democrats are just so eager to “out” Republicans that are gay that no one can tell they are gay, even other gays.
Is Gaydar hereditary? Or do you develope it in some gay studies class? Maybe it is a special DNA possessed by gays? Gee, where are are the studies on the Gaydar gene?
Do you two have jobs as comedians at Charlie Brown’s?
Just because you know someone is gay you don’t have to be a blabbermouth. lol
I think outing someone that does not want to be outed is invasion of provacy and bad for business. I know Mr. Hlavac personally, and aside form the occasional remarks about cute guys, you’d never know he was gay. you’d think he was from New York. I don’t present as gay either, except i don’t ever look at women’s boobs except to read what is on the t-shirt and the ones escorting them. Jim has had some terrific posts here, I am glad he has taken the time to reach out.
@ted:
Of course you do. That is precisely why you showed up here. To give him support for his agenda. Guess it didn’t bother you when he called for the killing of all the “breeders” on his own web site.
And btw, what does a person from New York look like compared to a person from Chicago, St. Louis, LA, or Pittsburg? Do I need some kind of Gaydar for that, as well?
You clowns think you are being too cute by half. All you’re proving is what clowns you are.
@retire05:
When I was in school, there were no “gay studies.” “Gaydar” was something you discovered you had. In 1976, I saw a photograph of Greg Louganis’ face, and I knew he has gay. I told as much to my friends who were not gay, as I thought that they might be interested in the fact. They were surprised when he came out in 1994, but I was not.
I am sorry if you thought I was being a clown with what I said, as no joke was intended.
If you are rolling on the floor laughing, you really don’t have a clue.
@George Wells:
No, George, it is you who doesn’t have a clue. Perhaps one of your buddies here can buy you one. I suggest you research the whole “gay” movement, starting in Germany in the late 1800’s and promoted by the Fabian Socialists and the Frankfurt Marxists. Get back to me when you have done that, until then, I have become bored with you.
@retire05:
You are blinded by your own bibliography.
By withdrawing into your fantasy past, you marginalize yourself today.
Better tighten those blinders:
Minnesota will be state #12.
@ Ted: Post-script to #28:
On todays Minnesota house vote for gay marriage:
“The vote broke largely along party lines, with 71 of 73 Democrats backing it and 57 of 61 Republicans opposing.”
Same story, different state.
Electing Republicans may or may not help the economy, but doing so will certainly NOT advance gay marriage or any other gay civil right.
@George Wells:
Hey, George, you just got bitch slapped by Mata. Now be a brave boy and take her on. I dare you.
@retire05:
XOXO
Ret05- Did it bother you when you first heard Shakespeare’s comment “The first thing we do, let’s kill all the lawyers…”?
It’s a little more chilling when you are a faggot and you are in a locker room or a bar and someone talks about beating up a faggot to you because they think you are straight.
@ted:
Not being a fan opf Shakespeare, I really don’t care what he said hundreds of years ago. And it doesn’t mean that because of his low opinion of lawyers that people then rushed out and killed all the lawyers.
It’s also frightening to be a woman and hear rap songs about bitches and hos and how they should be abused. Words can be hurtful. It doesn’t mean that you are going to be harmed physically. But being the drama queens you, and George, are, you make it sound like beating up a “faggot” is the standard topic of conversations in all locker rooms and bars.
What about the conversations that gays have about “freaking out straights?” Or do you ignore the trash spoke by your own ilk?
@Smorgasbord: #22 Smorgy:
I think you may have, at least partially, answered your own question when you said: “Do you honestly think people would choose to be gay, knowing how they are going to be treated by most people?” So do you think that they will say they CHOSE to be gay knowing they would be ridiculed when they could say it ‘they were born that way’ and get your sympathy? While I believe that many are ‘born that way’ I also think some choose to be that way. I agree with you that ‘marriage’ is a man and woman thing. Let gay guys come up with another word for a male union that gives them the same rights. If a person does not like the laws in a state they live in and there is a state with more favorable laws, move.
@Jim Hlavac: #24
Funny. Just watch what happens to the conversation when someone that is NOT gay is labelled as gay. They blow a fuse. So while many will say there is nothing wrong with being gay, just call a straight person gay and see the reaction. It kinda exposes the way they ‘really feel’ about it.
@George Wells: #30
That’s about the most insulting paragraph I have ever read directed toward discrimination of Gays. “”Other factors include olfactory distinctions and audible characteristics. “” So they smell differently and talk/make sounds differently? So they ‘look’ differently, smell differently and talk differently. And I thought your position was that they are the same as anyone else.
@ Redteam:
Good GRIEF! What language barrier are we laboring over?
What part was “insulting?” I read the post again, and I can’t find it. The post was an honest answer meant to inform, not insult. It spoke the truth as I know it, and as I am the gay person here, maybe you should consider that I might be at least somewhat… familiar… with the subject?
“So they smell differently and talk/make sounds differently?” Of course they do! Tell me you’ve never heard a gay guy talking and could tell by the “lisp” or “inflection” in his voice that he was “gay.” Some sound so gay even YOU can hear it! Others are not so obvious, but gay people have refined the ability to distinguish the difference for the reason I suggested. And yes,we smell different too. Perhaps you’ve heard of human pheromones? You think gay people don’t have them?
My position has NEVER been that we are the same as everybody else. WE are indeed VERY different. Perhaps you forgot my discussion of the fact that homosexuality is NOT “normal.” That means that we are not like everybody else. It was my position that we deserved the same TREATMENT under the Law, as suggested by the Constitution, which is not the same thing as “BEING” like everybody else.
@George Wells:
Very interesting answer, I’m not sure that you even know what you’re advocating. So all gay people speak with a ‘lisp’ and are limp wristed? including females?
@Redteam: #43
I still say ALL gays are born that way, just like there are babies born that have all the male and female parts. They didn’t choose to be half man and half woman.
@Redteam #47:
You are indeed a master of reading both words and meanings that are not there.
“So all gay people speak with a ‘lisp’ and are limp wristed? including females?”
If you re-read what I posted, you will not find the words: “all,” “limp-wristed” or “female.” If you would confine your remarks (and questions) to what I DID say, it would help.
Again: There is a range of anomalous inflections found predominantly in the speech patterns of gay males. These patterns develop as the individual associates with other children or young adults and reflect the speech characteristics of those particular peer groups. (It should be noted that this “association” need not include a physical presence, as a child my associate with a group” in absentia,” like identifying with a television character.)
Perhaps you have encountered a white person who grew up in a black neighborhood, associating with other black children both at school and at play. If you listen to that white person speak without looking, you would think that you were listening to a black person. That is an example of inflection adoption by association. The same thing happens with gay people. When a gay male child associates with girls (frequently because boys reject him as being different) he will adopt some of the speech patterns of the female group. This may present as frequent exclamations of “Oh DEAR!” or OMG!, phrases not likely to be as popular among macho boys. Similarly, the range of vocal intonation employed in conversation may take on a feminine sensativity that would be overly expressive of emotion for a normal male.
This is but one example, and the feminization of speech patterns does not occur with every male gay. Some love “masculinity” so much that they emulate a macho persona, and this include masculine vocal characteristics. This pattern adoption effect is also found among lesbians, as each individual chooses her own peer group and adopts speech patterns accordingly. Haven’t you ever heard a woman speek rough-and-tough, and thought “Lesbian?” Haven’t you ever listened to a waiter describing the menu specials and thought “Gay!”
The individual effects in each case would be difficult to quantify, as competing influences are at work, but in the statistical aggregate, you would find a disproportionate incidence of anomalous speech inflections among gay people.
Gay people are attuned to these subtle speech patterns, and they are a component of what is euphemistically referred to as “Gaydar.”
@Smorgasbord: Smorg, I don’t disagree with your statement about how babies are born. I agree that humans are born from 100% male to 100% female and all stages in between. But I do believe that due to circumstances some that are born toward the male side/female side at some point make a conscious decision to be the other. It may be the ones that are 51-60% one way or something like that. I have known more than one person that is ‘clearly’ homosexual but choose not to live that life. I think that if they can make that decision and live it, then they can also make the other decision and live with it also.