1. This site uses cookies. By continuing to use this site, you are agreeing to our use of cookies. Learn More.

Would this conversation bother you?

Discussion in 'Chit Chat' started by Burnedcloset, Dec 1, 2014.

  1. Burnedcloset

    Full Member

    Joined:
    Oct 27, 2014
    Messages:
    1,072
    Likes Received:
    0
    Location:
    santas workshop
    Ok, so, I was in the gym today and I overheard a conversation between two friends (girl and a guy).

    Girl: so how was your thanksgiving?
    Guy:it was good, I worked Black Friday.
    Girl: how was that?
    Guy: we sold so much stuff. My best friend came over to shop. He ran into Guy1 (couldn't remember his name). He said he was gay.
    Girl: really? He's gay. Like Guy2
    Guy: no, Guy2 is like SUPER GAY! Guy1 was just gay.
    Girl: yeah.....didn't he date jessica?
    Guy: yeah she is so stupid. She must have never even known.

    Now! This bothered/annoyed me so badly. They were not homophobic either. It was just normal conversation. They actually seemed cool with it or like allies but, it made me instantly feel "bad". Like I was a bad thing.

    I just kept thinking. "How are they so quick to label people. Acting like it was so simple. Why did he HAVE to mention that he was gay. Why is it just normal conversation to them. What is super gay?"

    I started to not like these people. Even though what they said wasn't that bad.

    Would this bother you?
     
  2. kageshiro

    kageshiro Guest

    Joined:
    Oct 14, 2012
    Messages:
    655
    Likes Received:
    0
    Location:
    in your soul
    yes they sound ignorant
     
  3. LostLion

    Full Member

    Joined:
    Aug 9, 2014
    Messages:
    407
    Likes Received:
    5
    Location:
    United States of 'Murica.
    Gender:
    Male
    Gender Pronoun:
    He
    Sexual Orientation:
    Bisexual
    Out Status:
    Some people
    No, it doesn't bother me. Gossip is gossip, it never sounds good if you aren't the one talking it.

    It would bother me if this convo happened between friends of mine, or family, but even then only the latter would really bother me.
     
  4. Hexagon

    Full Member

    Joined:
    May 1, 2011
    Messages:
    8,558
    Likes Received:
    1
    Location:
    Earth
    Yes. I dislike both gossip, and people who treat sexuality that way.
     
  5. Chip

    Board Member Admin Team Advisor Full Member

    Joined:
    May 9, 2008
    Messages:
    16,551
    Likes Received:
    4,750
    Location:
    northern CA
    Gender:
    Male
    Gender Pronoun:
    He
    Sexual Orientation:
    Gay
    Out Status:
    Out to everyone
    Maybe I just run with a different crowd, but among my friends, we constantly talk about who is gayer than whom in our crowd, who's super gay and who isn't, and all that sort of stuff. I'll often make comments like "That was incredibly gay" or "That was about the gayest thing ever" to one of my friends, and they will do it back.

    We find it funny and not at all offensive. But I think it's all about your comfort level with yourself and with being gay and what that means.
     
  6. DrinkBudweiser

    Regular Member

    Joined:
    Nov 25, 2014
    Messages:
    138
    Likes Received:
    0
    Location:
    Indiana
    Gender:
    Female
    Sexual Orientation:
    Lesbian
    Out Status:
    Out to everyone
    Not many straight folks are really knowledgeable about what's acceptable to say and what isn't in the LGBT community. You have to let stuff like that slide, especially considering you were eavesdropping in the first place. And the conversation didn't sound like it contained any hatred anyway. Just a little bit of poor wording.

    On top of that, there are some gay men who are extremely flamboyant and that's easily going to gain a title of "more gay acting" in the mind of anyone, regardless of their orientation.
     
  7. OGS

    OGS
    Full Member

    Joined:
    Feb 1, 2014
    Messages:
    2,716
    Likes Received:
    728
    Location:
    Chicago, IL
    Gender:
    Male
    Gender Pronoun:
    He
    Sexual Orientation:
    Gay
    Out Status:
    Out to everyone
    I have to say it wouldn't bother me at all--like Chip said I could easily imagine a similar conversation taking place among gay people. Considering the fact that you don't know them and weren't actually even being spoken to it seems odd that you would draw much in the way of conclusions about them from this conversation--other than perhaps the conclusion that they weren't homophobic.
     
  8. OGS

    OGS
    Full Member

    Joined:
    Feb 1, 2014
    Messages:
    2,716
    Likes Received:
    728
    Location:
    Chicago, IL
    Gender:
    Male
    Gender Pronoun:
    He
    Sexual Orientation:
    Gay
    Out Status:
    Out to everyone
    I was thinking about it a bit more and I think it really comes down, like Chip alluded to, to how comfortable you are with "gay"--the word, the concept, the identity. We all know that being gay doesn't actually have anything to do with the stereotype, but the stereotype is there and some people more closely approximate it than others--as was acknowledged in the overheard conversation. It's just a thing--and until someone assigns value to it it doesn't have any. I have friends who are straight, friends who are gay and friends who are super gay. I don't really have times when I'm straight, most of the time I'm just gay but I have my moments (and they tend to be among my best moments) when I'm super gay. It doesn't bother me to classify it that way because I don't have negative associations with the term or, indeed, with the stereotype. And I really tend to assume that other people don't either until they prove otherwise.

    For me I would hear the conversation as roughly analogous to the following conversation:

    Girl1 dyed her hair, can you believe it she went blond!
    Blond like Girl2?
    No, Girl2 is like super blond, Girl1 is just blond.

    For me, it's like hair color, it's just a thing about people. I guess there might be people out there who hate blonds and genuinely attribute bad things to them on the basis of the fact that they are blond but I wouldn't assume so until they actually gave indication of that. I really tend to think that the offense you took at the conversation you overheard says more about how you feel about "gay" than it does about how the people you overheard think about it.
     
  9. shinji

    shinji Guest

    Joined:
    Aug 26, 2014
    Messages:
    629
    Likes Received:
    0
    Location:
    Bulgaria
    Gender:
    Male
    [​IMG]



    On topic. People are stupid, especially towards things they don't understand. So my suggestion would be to simply ignore them. They don't even realize the stupidity of their conversation, why blame them for it? Why waste time worrying about it?
     
  10. Michael

    Regular Member

    Joined:
    Aug 30, 2014
    Messages:
    2,602
    Likes Received:
    4
    Location:
    Europe
    Gender:
    Other
    Gender Pronoun:
    He
    Sexual Orientation:
    Bisexual
    Out Status:
    Not out at all
    ... Not anymore. Earphones + too used to hear such bull... And worse, way worse...
     
  11. The Virgo

    Regular Member

    Joined:
    Nov 11, 2014
    Messages:
    1
    Likes Received:
    0
    Location:
    Tennessee
    Gender:
    Male
    Sexual Orientation:
    Gay
    No... Why do people have such a problem with "labels" Its a way to describe someone sexuailty,gender,race,state of being. like what the hell everytime i look up someone saying I HATE LABELS I HATE LABELS
     
  12. OnTheHighway

    Full Member

    Joined:
    Oct 9, 2014
    Messages:
    3,934
    Likes Received:
    632
    Location:
    Florida
    Gender:
    Male
    Gender Pronoun:
    He
    Sexual Orientation:
    Gay
    Out Status:
    Out to everyone
    Guilty as charged on this one as well.....
     
  13. AKTodd

    Full Member

    Joined:
    Feb 9, 2013
    Messages:
    3,190
    Likes Received:
    4
    Location:
    Norfolk, VA
    Nope. Wouldn't bother me at all.

    They didn't seem to be expressing any opinion about being gay, just gossiping, which nearly everyone does at least sometimes.

    Todd
     
  14. confuzzled82

    Full Member

    Joined:
    Apr 15, 2012
    Messages:
    3
    Likes Received:
    1
    Location:
    Call district W8
    Gender:
    Female
    Gender Pronoun:
    She
    Sexual Orientation:
    Bisexual
    Out Status:
    Out to everyone
    Meh. I think knowing the people makes a huge difference on how things get interpreted. For example, in my poker group, one person is sometimes reffered to as "the gayest straight guy you'll ever find", he's an ICU nurse, not into sports at all, and loves reading. Another is sometimes reffered to as "the straightest gay guy you'll ever meet", he's a truck driver, loves football, and fits a majority of the masculine stereotype. There is definitely a jocular sense to how these are said.
     
  15. MCairo

    Full Member

    Joined:
    Aug 10, 2014
    Messages:
    663
    Likes Received:
    0
    Location:
    Seoul, KR
    Gender:
    Male
    Gender Pronoun:
    He
    Sexual Orientation:
    Questioning
    Out Status:
    Not out at all
    Not really. I can see myself having this kind of conversation with my friends.
    Although the last line sounds a bit annoying haha.
     
  16. resu

    Advisor Full Member

    Joined:
    Jun 23, 2013
    Messages:
    4,968
    Likes Received:
    395
    Location:
    Oklahoma City
    Gender:
    Male
    Gender Pronoun:
    He
    Sexual Orientation:
    Gay
    Out Status:
    Some people
    It's insensitive (idk, I guess most of my friends don't gossip like that), but i can understand the sentiments.
     
  17. Quem

    Full Member

    Joined:
    May 1, 2014
    Messages:
    1,288
    Likes Received:
    0
    Location:
    The Netherlands
    Gender:
    Male
    Gender Pronoun:
    He
    Sexual Orientation:
    Gay
    Out Status:
    Out to everyone
    It really depends! In general, I would say I'm indifferent.

    If I know what person they mean, I might very well get annoyed. It really depends on the situation, the one they talk about, the people who gossip, and so on.
     
  18. BiShoegazer

    Regular Member

    Joined:
    Aug 24, 2014
    Messages:
    0
    Likes Received:
    0
    Location:
    Catalunya
    Gender:
    Male
    Sexual Orientation:
    Bisexual
    Out Status:
    Not out at all
    Nah, it wouldn't bother me that much. I'm not very sensitive to those sorts of things or anything in general, really.
     
  19. antibinary

    Full Member

    Joined:
    Oct 20, 2014
    Messages:
    778
    Likes Received:
    0
    Location:
    UK
    WTF does super gay even mean?
     
  20. Burnedcloset

    Full Member

    Joined:
    Oct 27, 2014
    Messages:
    1,072
    Likes Received:
    0
    Location:
    santas workshop
    Maybe it is about what I feel the word "gay" comes with. I'm just not sure. Maybe it's because I'm in the closet. Maybe it's because the guy was (most likely) straight, and I was attracted to him. Maybe I was jealous of that girl. I'm not sure. It's just I got this bad feeling from it. I admit it was wrong of me. I shouldn't take offense to something this trivial. It should just go through one ear and out the other but, it instantly made me get quiet and think about what they said. It was a state of shock. I was mad at them.

    I just felt that he had no reason to bring up this "gay" person. I'm not the proudest person but, I am 100% out to myself.

    Maybe I'm jealous they can talk about this stuff and I can't, talk about sexuality.

    I hope this doesn't make me seem like a bad person, it's just the way I felt.