A "COMMUNITY" FORUM

I’ve been avoiding writing this post for a year. The topic felt like a downer…even for me. I sensed that, if I delved into the subject, I’d get riled up. I’d feel anger and shame toward part of my “community” which went against the much-hyped marketing machine promoting all the love and joy of #Pride. 

 

Truthfully, I’ve always felt “community” was a generous, aspirational term, perhaps even nothing more than The Emperor’s New Clothes…nothing at all. 

 

Gimme a “G”

 

When I was coming out in West Hollywood in the early ’90s, I questioned the term as applied to gay men. I rarely felt any connotative sense of closeness with the other gays packed into Rage or Arena. It seemed more like a competition and I didn’t even register as a contestant. Gay humor of the day was referred to as “camp” and, from what I could tell, it involved invoking names of actresses from old Hollywood movies and putting down every other gay person in the bar, including the “friends” you came with. Barbs were hilarious. The sad gays—the non-contestants—were easy butts of the jokes but so were the hunky men blessed with biceps and bubble butts. They didn’t notice the commoners in the bar so they had to be dissed. Jokes about IQ, penis size and those miserable acting auditions that meant they had to hang on to their catering jobs. 

 

I learned a few semi-snappy lines, but I couldn’t keep up whenever two people in my group got on a roll of tearing someone to shreds, all in good fun. I could see the cleverness, but the tone never sat well with me. So many of us had gone through our entire public school experience being bullied or desperately trying to pass as straight, perhaps proving our vulnerable masculinity by joining in on bashing the girly boys who had no hope of passing.

 

We’d survived, damaged for certain, but the worst was supposed to be behind us, not behind our backs in our “safe” spaces where we could swoon over Janet Jackson’s newly sculpted body and that video of hers with even swoon-worthier Antonio Sabàto Jr, now an unrepentant Trumper.

 

As gay men, our “community” required significant consultation and restructuring. Not that anyone ever asked me.

 

Add the “L”

 

The “community” seemed even more tenuous when factoring in lesbians. The first out person I knew was a lesbian, a roommate and co-worker of mine. She’s still near and dear to me in my heart even if we haven’t seen one another in decades. I never seem to find myself in the Tulsa area, go figure. I met many of her friends and I swore I was meant to be a lesbian. More down to earth, yet somewhat guarded. Like me. I felt safer and more welcome among lesbians than among gays. Part of that, of course, was lesbians weren’t judging—and rejecting—me for my looks. I could just be me and they could be themselves. Life was comfortable.

 

But the more I stepped into a world of gay men, the less that space seemed to include lesbians. Our “community” seemed to mostly operate on parallel paths, supportive in the abstract, but the gays seemed to think the lesbians were too serious, too settled down and, gosh-darn, too outdoorsy. My take: too much substance. Gay men were more into “lite” and fluffy…and six-pack abs. My life would have made much more sense as a lesbian.

 

How ’bout a “B”?

 

Then there was that B of folklore, the bisexual. I didn’t feel a sexual attraction to women, but I loved the idea that someone could fall in love or have sex with either gender. (It was a two-gender world back then. I love the notion of being pansexual even more now.) This was so egalitarian. Love any, love all. This seemed evolved. It just didn’t fit me. 

 

Bs were uniformly mocked by gay men. Worse, there was disdain and resentment. We gays had done the hard work in coming out, but bisexuals were still trying to have it both ways which clearly couldn’t possibly be a thing. It was cowardly. Only “out” when it was convenient. Someone needed to grab them by the ankle and pull that other foot out of the closet. Part of the “community”? Puh-leaze. Come back when you’ve figured it all out. Yeah, the hostility was palpable.

 

Teetering with “T”

 

Ts. Oh, dear. This was the toughest. Trans was about gender more than sexuality. It was a distraction. Bringing them into the “community” made things more complex and gays didn’t like much complexity, nothing more than spirited debates about whether Jack from Will & Grace was TOO gay, whether Ellen was funny and whether it was still okay to ogle Milli Vanilli videos even though they were straight lip-synchers. Gays struggled with accepting the more feminine among us. What a leap to come to terms with gender changes whether FTM or MTF! Couldn’t we all just order another martini and ogle the go-go boy’s thong?

 

It is “LGBT,” right?

 

But we’ve all come around, haven’t we? Surely we’re closer. We’ve gone from a Pride weekend to a whole #PrideMonth. Doesn’t that bring on more familiarity? Doesn’t exposure lead to understanding and acceptance? Isn’t that what Joan Baez or some other beloved sixties icon tells us? Is that what Britney’s “Stronger” is about? (Really, I’m more about that “Oops!...I Did It Again” ditty.) If not Britney, than Gaga with “Born This Way.” How many times did I hear that last month. Surely, it’s sinking in.

 

But, no. Not for everyone. There are gay men, lesbians and bisexuals who are firmly anti-T. I was coasting along, surviving COVID, avoiding JK Rowling hogwash and openly wondering how many transgender girls—just girls, really—were building trophy cases for all their track meet medals. Apparently, “real” girls would no longer have spots on the softball team, in golf or in the pool. People were changing gender to get a massive collection of high school ribbons. My god, what a coup! 

 

Quite by chance, I came upon a tweet with the hashtag #LGB. It looked funny. A typo. 

 

If only. They publicly claimed to be LGB. The T omission was intentional.

 

I then saw tweets denouncing proponents of “LGB without the T.” Were we really doing this? Were we still fracturing “community”? “LGB” didn’t mesh with rainbows, glitter, acceptance and inclusion. I can tell myself “LGB is a hate group—a rogue faction—not a hate “community.” I need to imagine it smaller, something containable. 

 

It’s time to cut the backbiting and belittling under the rainbow. How do we excommunicate a vial part of the “community”? 

 

And, for the grand finale, cheers to LGBTQQIP2SAA!

 

Let me unpack that: Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual, Transgender, Queer, Questioning, Intersex, Pansexual, Two-Spirit, Androgynous and Asexual. [That’s from one source. I’m not sure about “androgynous.” Is that “A” supposed to be for aromantic instead?] 

 

I saw that…some eyerolls. 

 

Not a good look among mean girls in high school and a worse look among supposedly evolved adults who want their own love and belonging without necessarily adapting to allow others to find a term that facilitates their own sense of identity.

 

There are various versions of the expanded acronym. It’s visually A LOT. That’s to be expected when it comes to diversity. I personally accept “Q” as in queer as the broadest term to refer generally to all of us, but I’m fine with people who cringe at Q or who don’t want to be swallowed up and unseen yet again with a big Q. Same for when LGBTQ or LGBTQ+ is used. It’s a fair point. When our “community” is referred to as capital-Q “Queer,” most people see the gays and lesbians first and foremost. For those who don’t identify as either, Q can have the effect of erasing everyone else, reducing them to “M” for miscellaneous. 

 

Think about that…Nobody wants to be miscellaneous, a word rarely even spelled out. Misc., akin to Etc. That doesn’t feel like accepting a person’s identity.

 

Full disclosure: I don’t have a longer acronym memorized. I will get some of the other letters wrong. I will inadvertently leave something out. The slight to whomever identifies with the forgotten letter will always be unintentional—but it will understandably offend. 

 

I can handle being corrected. 

 

I can even allow for the fact I may not be able to keep up. 

 

I try. I continue to listen and read. I’ve been intentional about seeking and reading books—both fiction and nonfiction—that center on letters for which I have less familiarity. As an introvert, I stick with a few close friends, whether near or far, and, now that I’m not working, the chances of meeting someone with a less common or new-to-me identity are slim. Reading makes my world bigger and, yes, more diverse.

 

I don’t ever want to shut down when it comes to learning about our growing or changing “community.” If I do, let me step out of the way. The world evolves. Change happens. Let it.

 

There are many changes in other realms I don’t know much about. TikTok. What generation is supposedly in its prime now. Bitcoin. That’s okay. I can be uninformed; just don’t let me be misinformed and, if I feel I am, let me have the sense to shut up. 

 

I’d like to hope that #PrideMonth has emboldened younger queers and enlightened more of the older ones. I’d love it if we crossed some bridges together. Let there be less ageism in our “community,” too! Let the younger generations accept us older queers with the labels we selected based on what was on the coming out menu du jour. 

 

I suspect that some who are advocating for greater recognition, respect and rights for people who identify as trans, ace or pansexual may at times come off as strident or obnoxious. For trans people, in particular, they are under attack by politicians, by conservatives and, as noted above, by people who are supposed to be part of their own community. 

 

We are not our best selves when under attack. We may be angrier, less eloquent. For those who are younger, there are also developmental issues of having less tact and having a sense of knowing more than is actually the case. Younger people will always have a tendency to rub older folks the wrong way and, unfortunately, be dismissive of “out of touch” oldsters. Context regarding age, external agitation and the stakes should help the more “mature” among us to see some of that stridence as passion and conviction. There’s no need for it to be a personal affront or to dismiss the core message.

 

The “community” can itself grow, learn from its past (and current) examples of intolerance and become more welcoming. Let the real work behind #Pride continue throughout the year.